Kharnage

*Incomprehensible snarling* I'll feed you to the tots, I will!

Buffs 1. Maurice. Give him an ability as a versatile model that everyone would want, like, a bonus action "Blood Oath: Friendly model only. Target model suffers 1 damage, and gains the Ruthless ability until the end phase." Lowkey synergizes with Nephilim cuz we like our plink damage, but also it covers the gaping hole of having only 2 ruthless models in faction. 2. Blood Wretch. Just, give 'em Disguised. Straight up. 3. Razorspine Rattler. Give 'em versatile, and Adaptive Evolution. That way we have our versatile scheme runner, and also they don't feel bad in Marcus crews for permanently claiming upgrades. Nerfs: 1. Mmmhmm. You know what it is. 2. Mysterious Emissary's Hungry Land markers should go away at the end of turn. 3. Insidious Madness. Make their "remove your focus and give you distracted" move have a resist, like seduction.

Texas meta has trouble finding Arcanists or Outcasts at all. My little ecosystem within the meta has started theorycrafting how to play them locally because we're tired of Neverborn and Ten Thunders. I can only speak to that meta though. The consistent trend I've found seems to be that whichever brave souls representing Guild get their teeth stomped out and then they swear off Guild and play something they can win with.

So to be clear. The consensus is "bring it move, then BFJ, then Bring It attack, if applicable"?

Ironsides successfully uses Bring it! on Hayreddin, who has Inhuman Reflexes. Does the bring it action end, then Hayreddin BFJs, then he fails the generated attack for being out of range? Or does the generated attack occur because its "part of Bring It!"? I feel like I know the answer but I'm asking for posterity of a tournament I'm at.

Nope, not being able to black joker on the Fly With Me flips and damage tracks is pretty rad, and they have combat finesse and Regen +2, which is tankier than Hayreddin with his Df 6 and stone use. Honestly, he needs the BFJ and I need the card draw, and I don't want to put it on the Shaman because he'll lose the upgrade if/when he has to replace a mature. Hayreddin is the only not-reach-2" meleer I have, and he needs that BFJ to stay alive. Hayreddin is used to splat-bat people into the floor. He's got a better damage track than Nekima, essentially. Also he's our only summoner in Keyword. 2/3/4, plus Necrotic Decay for +2 damage, and because he took damage from the Necrotic Decay trigger, he provokes black blood, dealing an extra point of damage for effectively 4+1/5+1/6+1. to top it off, he has Blade Rush now, for a potential 4+1+1/5+1+1/6+1+1 damage track, all for a single AP. Finally, he has mask trigger for double-Pustule, for a potential 4 AoE undodgeable damage in a 2 inch pulse, not including his own Blood for Blood. Watching a model who thinks its safe with high stats, or serene countenance, or take the hit, but just eating 4 damage with no resist, is super clean. Or worse, multiple models in the radius.

I'm sure you've read my list elsewhere, but the Double-Mature build Nekima w/ IR Hayreddin w/ IR Mature w/ AP Mature w/ AP Black Blood Shaman Blood Hunter 7 stones Is what I have the most success with. Crazy fast, and all but guaranteeing initiative due to double Ancient Pact AND low model count, it's super useful. You end up running schemes with effectively 12 stone models, but I haven't really regretted it. Double-shaman builds found disfavor with me because turn 1 engagements define my games, and sitting around in the deployment zone haka dancing instead of aggressing or getting to critical parts of the board can cost you, but the singleton Shaman hands out plenty of punch to his models who are then ready to roll. The grow builds of turning both shamans into Matures sounds cool, but they're 100% going to start turn 2 with 6 wounds, and also it probably cost me master AP to get them big, instead of Nekima hauling that giant sword around, she's still in my deployment. That being said, play Nephilim how you wanna play it, diversify those builds. Not that it doesn't instill pride in me to see others using the double-mature build, but list diversity is fun too.

Yeah that'd be rad, but this doesn't quite work. "Fiendish Gamble: Once per Activation. When this model would flip a card, it may instead choose a card its controller has removed from the game and place it into the Conflict. That card is no longer considered removed from the game." So when you obey the Stitched, you can, as the controller, use ALL the cards you've removed from the game. Which, unless you've hired some OOK lucid dream models, is nothing. Also, Gamble your Life is enemy only, and the Stitched don't change allegiance during the obey, so you could only truly gamble against yourself. Top to bottom, the Stitched are pretty well insulated against offensive obey.

Replace No Prisoners with "You're the Reason I Drink", abilities include Drunken Kung Fu, Perverse Metabolism, and as a Minion only Ability, Foul Mouthed Motivation. It's the most balanced thing I can think of.

It's at least the second time a demonstrably competent player has gone "having fought with and against Stitched, I think they're too good." and he's responded basically to the effect of "but that must be a you-problem and not a stitched-problem."

Relevant abilities in question: From the Guilty: "Guilty as Charged: Friendly Tormented models may treat this model as an enemy model for the purposes of Actions, Abilities, and Triggers." From the Tormented Keyword: "Torment: At the end of this model's Activation, if it damaged an enemy model with an Attached Upgrade, it may draw a card." And the wording on Jack Daw's Suppressed Memories attack action: "Target suffers 2/3/3 damage. Then, if the target is an enemy model, Attach an Injustice Upgrade to it." ...with trigger... "On Your Heels. Enemy Only. Place this model into base contact with the target." My question is this: Can Jack Daw count the Guilty as a friendly model for the action itself (so no attaching the Injustice Upgrade), count him as an enemy for the trigger On Your Heels, and then count him as an enemy for damaging an enemy model with an upgrade, assuming I handed him a general upgrade during hiring?

Kentauroi have Like the Wind as a trigger, a 2 inch reach, and Ride With Me, so they have plenty of opportunity to get out of engagement, or avoid engagement entirely while charging. Remember; engagement is now one-way; So if your 2 inch reach Kentauroi is stabbing a 1 inch reach model from 2 inches away, he's not engaged, and may charge again. Also, he can leave with the Like the Wind trigger after stampeding in, or he can just charge and stampede into base contact, Ride With Me out, and charge back, stampeding again. As for Goryo... there is both not much of a benefit for charging multiple times, and not much of a way to make it happen. If they're fighting 0 inch reach models, they could charge twice, or if their initial target dies on the first attack, they could charge twice. This would be more for movement than anything.

Went digging through Neverborn's closet and realized the greatest user of Stitched could possibly be... Collodi. His 4 Marionettes can put down 2 of their own number, (Sacrifice 1 attacks Sacrifice 2, Sacrifice 2 attacks Sacrifice 1, 3rd Marionette attacks each of them 1 time, two scrap markers) and as long as you have a pair of nines of masks be it by stone or by card, your in keyword Widow Weaver can summon two Stitched. Collodi Entourage walks his horde up the board twice, and then resummons his dead Marionettes on a 6. So far this whole engine has cost me 8 stones, plus maybe 1-2 soulstones in game. Cries of "But he's Dead Man's Hand" kinda fall short because DMH has been allowed in every tournament I've ever been to, and I certainly don't have the questionable privilege of playing in the coddled UK meta. The comedy of combining the Lucky Effigy's aura with Know the Warrior from Action Scene on Marionettes aside, Collodi has a very real shot of just putting out absurd amounts of resummonable AP and damage, largely centered on the Stitched. He can even hire Mannequins to keep Ms. Weaver alive. Hinamatsu is like a nice afterthought, honestly.

Firstly, it's not versatile. Don't know why it isn't, but it's not. As for Marcus, it gives him a Df 6 model that can't ditch its upgrades, which sounds bad until you start getting Obeyed to attack yourself, conveniently electing to buff your attacks at the cost of your upgrades if you had adaptive evolution. They're, despite having 1 less wound, tankier than cats, and don't require a decent card to use their free move, just any card at all, assuming they're unengaged and not in terrain, and still retain Deadly Pursuit. They also synergize well with the Scorpius aura because poison. Constriction is also poorly worded, and means that enemies also take neg flips to attack them if they want to disengage. Basically they're tanky, good scheme runners. Not offensively scary, but they could serve a purpose. Are they great? No, but I think they're decent and recommend a second look, they're my special snowflake Marcus minion since no one else likes them.

First off, this isn't on paper anymore. I've fought it. I've also fought, using it. It's stupid. I'm not theorycrafting here. I've played into Ashigaru, I've played into Katashiro (A LOT), and I've played into Stitched. I'm not even some justifiably bitter guild player who's tired of losing into Neverborn. I'm actively deleting models with no effort in my own native faction and saying it's too strong. This is M3e. If your bar is "only OP if taken OOK", that doesn't hold up in a game design philosophy of Keywords. If I had a model overperforming within a keyword and only within a keyword, what would you use to assess that? As kind of a step back; if you genuinely believe these models to be on par with each other, why is it that the Stitched are able to generate 4 pages of debate about what needs changing, and also sparking similar debates in other threads, where Ashigaru, Katashiro, and even Minako Rei have not? Do you truly believe in your heart of hearts that this is all smoke and no fire?

Unless you summon them with Toshiro, which was his example I was countering. Then they have to take a 3 damage hit before armor, then any hit, to just, be dead. He can Foul Mouthed Motivation them to heal to full, but that's a pretty universally useful ability and is an actual opportunity cost, as opposed to the full health Stitched regardless of context.

Katashiro are df4 5 wounds, and literally no other defensive mechanics. Quite one-shottable by a focused Ml 6 beater. Ashigaru come into play with 2 less health, and are also Df 4. No one worth their salt is investing more than 2 AP, and certainly aren't sweating the outcome of the damage flip. Also neither of those models are even remotely as threatening in damage output. People end up having to invest the resources they'd spend killing models 2-3 stones more expensive than Stitched, while taking damage from them that matches the output of models 2-3 more stones than Stitched. And while Minako should have never been Versatile, and certainly cleans up any scheme running needs a TT player has, assuming you hired Ototo AND have tomes to burn, she and her summons are quite manageable. Spending 19 stones (including Ototo OOK tax) so you can summon super flimsy scheme runners is good, but it's defeatable by a variety of approaches. This discussion is for another thread, but Shenlong was the real powerhouse in that winning list. Stitched come in full health no matter who summons them. I don't know who you're playing into but if you're having trouble getting the stitched into a meaningful place to affect combat (as Dreamer summons literally Base to Base with enemies, and Zoraida can have the doll double walk up, and then have WW pull the scrap and summon in base with herself for 12 inches away from Zoraida) then... I have reason to believe the player's positioning skills could use work. Across two games of Zoraida having Widow Weaver summoning them so far, Stitched have used a grand total of 2 AP walking. Also you have, as a Dreamer player, a chorus of Daydreams ready and willing to scoot Stitched around at no real effort or cost. You're going to take 3 of them anyway because Lucid Dream spam is what the Stitched enjoy playing with (but as Zoraida can tell you, don't need to function at a high level). Most schemes force your opponent to cross the middle line of the map to score, and it's just not that hard to get to and fight them with your 6 inch "come near me and you die" bubble.

Yeah, Zoraida has this really powerful combo where she allows for Stitched to be summoned onto the table, and lets them use their abilities 😜 My list is as follows: Zoraida w/ Ancient Pact Widow Weaver First Mate Bad Juju w/ Inhuman Reflexes Serena Bowman Will o the Wisp 7 stones You literally just kill summoned voodoo dolls with their "Served its Purpose" ability, drop a scrap, and summon Stitched. No other support than being able to summon them. When the Stitched or Serena kills things, she gets stuffing tokens that can let her avoid using scrap to summon them, and can even use her summon action multiple times in a turn. Zoraida theoretically also has the option of obeying them to use GYL some more, which I have done, but the fact remains, it's being able to summon them onto the table that's the problem, and Dreamer still does that. Truly, if they weren't in his summon pool, I wouldn't be so worried. If I had the reassurance that once I slew the Stitched, they'd be dead and gone for good, I would accept Df 6, Armor 1, 6 wounds with a poison punish as an acceptable gate to salvation. But as it stands, Widow Weaver or Dreamer, or even Vasilisa if you can find the 9 masks, can resummon the Stitched back onto the table after they finally die or kill themselves, and there are few than can even hope to win that exchange.

I am of course as you say, a humble servant of the God Empress, but that's just it; I actually come at the Stitched Together problem from a place of privilege. Nekima can kill them, and only just so. Access to plink damage from Blade Rush and Black Blood and chunk damage coming out of focused Stat 7 attacks is uniquely suited to bring them down, since their Df 6 armor 1 6 health makes them hugely annoying to deal with for their cost, and that's with the poison stacking penalty aside. My threshold for a person whom I can say with confidence will bring down a 6 stone minion without investing more than 2 AP is arguably the highest form of damage focused beater master, in the entire game. With Shaman focus support, no less. People who are actually good at killing things, that is to say, the plethora of stat 6 3/4/5 or 3/4/6 tracks in the game, can be matched out on a duel against Df 6 even with focus, and are quite likely to deal 2 damage, suffering poison in the process. The ambiguous and ever helpful "Just do shoot damage" is just what a dreamer player would say; they arbitrarily have wide access an armor ignoring attack that can target the model's weaker WP. For most of us, dealing actual AP efficient damage requires us to swing a sword, a claw, a Bisento, or flex our Chi-Infused abs. And the idea that I, or anyone, has to deny themselves 6 inch bubbles (that is to say, 13 inch diameter, as @Math Mathonwy says, since you'd measure 6 inches to the left and right of the 1 inch wide Stitched) of territory because Dreamer cunningly plopped down a 6 stone minion that indeed by definition MUST unbury on top of enemy models, is a pretty deaf understanding of what a 6 stone model should be able to do.

Sounds like we need to make an effort to reduce both the risk, and the reward, for their actions to make them less "swingy". Like, reducing the track to 2/3/4 for example :^) That way, they can fail more of these without dying, and also they don't instantly delete models far above their poundage.

To put my money where my mouth is, I played a Vassal game last night with Zoraida, hired Widow Weaver to summon in Stitched off of dead Voodoo Dolls, and it was brainlessly easy to kill things. I even lost one of my Stitched to Gamble Your Life, but dealt 28 raw damage with two summoned 6 stone minions over 3 turns. About half the time, the Stitched would Lucid Dream the card to Gamble with in its own activation, and the other half I'd just improve my deck and top deck the duels, knowing that I could just summon back dead ones (before Weaver died, of course). I had a bit of extra positioning opportunity to summon because I was playing into Mei Feng and scrap was everywhere rather than just where I summoned/killed dolls, but the fact remains the same; I got to run schemes/strats with Bad Juju, First Mate, and Widow Weaver because their AP being spent to scheme run was more efficient than using the Stitched. I doubt that this will change anyone's minds though; if I say "it's too strong, just look at the cards", its dismissed as Theoryfaux, and if I say "I've played games where it's dumb", it's dismissed as anecdotal. There is no point I could make where defenders of the Stitched would be like "Yeah okay maybe they need a little nudge".

I've played into the dreamer a few times. I've even won games into the dreamer. I've won a tournament game where I was able to kill him turn 1 before he activated. The God Empress Nekima is one of his less favorable matchups, since we have the speed and plink damage to make Dreamer sweat early. That being said, it still doesn't feel great when a 6 stone model spends two severes, top decks one actual duel in which he has inherent advantage, and bags himself a full health mature. Summonable 6 stone models 1 rounding 10 stone models with no small amount of consistency, I find to be problematic.

Nah, they're minions, and one of his best summons, pound for pound.

What if the 2/3/4 track had a trigger for swift action? You have to pass another simple duel, you by definition actually have to gamble something, and you had to get the suit in the first place. Armor hinders their damage more, but could still get quite a bit of raw damage with luck.

I'd be super cool with this. It's just getting greatsword hits (straight flips and all, HtW and stone use notwithstanding) at a 6 inch range is a lot for a 6 stone model. If you wanna gimmick your way into a 2/3/4, that's waaay more manageable. Dreamers keep their ignores-most-defensive-tech no-actual-duel-required tactical action, and their un-dreaming of cards, and the rest of us don't get two pieced by 6 stone models. Hell, it's even a benefit for the Stitched; he's only taking 1/2/3 after armor if he fails the compare flip.