Boomstick

13 minutes ago, Flippin' Wyrd Jamie said:

You can take them off really easy with any range attacks. They stand still for a turn. And if you kill asura they become useless. Definitely ways to deal with them 

Generally yes, but Asura can put out 4 a turn for a relatively small amount of resources, then use her bonus to make one take an action, all while she never has to leave her deployment zone in most cases. The ways to deal with her are there, but having faced her a few times, dealing with her/the zombies, are a bit much for her cost vs effectiveness.

Completely agree that there's a lot of theory on this thread. I do think a small tweak to Colette's survivability would help alleviate some of the frustration, hopefully from both sides.

Personally, in the ~6-7 games I've had with her across both versions of the beta, in her current form, I've never gotten her unbury functions to happen, because she's so tough that my opponent never targets her. I likewise have been blocked in burying her with her sword trigger due to either poorly timed black jokers, my opponent cheating a higher card than I had to stop the attack, or not being in a position where burying assisted her or her crew overly much.

So I think the best tweak to start with would be to remove Serene Countenance and replace it with something that says if she buries by her own tricks she can't be targeted while buried, or maybe all attacks targeting her while buried suffer a negative flip. This would remove a layer of defense for targeting her directly, which would be less frustrating to opponents, and allow her more choice on if she wants to bury or not, therefore helping her crew more by spreading out Distracted when she unburies, instead of being what I've seen in my experience: A leading lady who goes where she wants on the stage, but no one will act with her.

That said, with the addition of Assist helping Focus to counter Distracted, I think Distracted could return to being the negative to attack and damage it was when the closed beta was first announced.

15 minutes ago, cbtb11235813 said:

I like everything you have posted. I plan on testing Ramos tonight so I can have a fresh game to reference later

Thanks so much @cbtb11235813! I look forward to your findings as well. I'm sending in mine on the batrep form shortly. Mostly I think Ramos' current issues are due to him not getting as much of a look in the closed beta. I know I only saw a handful of games listing him then.

Agreed on all points. If it's not breaking anything in game beyond actually making Poison Gamin have some synergy, maybe @Kyle and @matt might look at letting the Open Beta test Rafkin in Sandeep's crew again?

So, had a Ramos game over the weekend, here are my thoughts.

For the rest of his summons (Mecharacnids in my case) Insignificant did not seem as huge an issue as I was concerned about, there there were a few points at the end of the game that would have changed the outcome significantly if one of them had been significant. BUT, for Steam Arachnids, they're in a perfect storm of not quite getting there.

First issue: if Steam Arachnids are insignificant, there are 2 reasons to summon them: to explode them or debuff an enemy's Df. If they are used as explosives, if's decently likely I'm giving my opponent a pass token for something that's not going to activate, or will activate, move into position, and probably die before I actually get to blow it up. If they're used for the Df debuff, they can hit a bit better, true, but really, you want that so Ramos can shoot better, and his gun does not ignore Friendly Fire.

Second issue: each Steam Arachnids needs its own scrap marker. For the Swarms and the Mecharacnids, I can see it, they're large and/or several different machines. But Swams are 3 Steam Arachnids, and also only need one Scrap Marker. I know logic doesn't always have a place in games, but it's definitely a heavy piece of cognitive dissonance. 

Long story short, at the end of the game I definitely would have taken Sandeep instead if I needed to play it again. I really felt like Ramos had 2 options for summoning: Mecharachnids and Swarms (The healbots don't do much for his crew). Ramos' summoning is so much more hindered in comparison, on top of summoning being reigned in in general in M3E.

So, to help alleviate all these issues, this is what occurred to me: 

1) Change the trigger on Ramos' summoning to say the summoned Steam Arachnids do not attach the summon upgrade. This will allow them the option of using a stone to summon them as scheme runners.

2) Add a clause to the summon upgrade to say Steam Arachnids with it attached come in mindless. That way without the trigger, Arachnids just summoned as bombs don't give pass tokens  unless they live to the following turn.

4) Add a bit to his summoning action that makes it so multiple Steam Arachnids can be summoned from the same Scrap marker.

3) Make Ramos' gun ignore friendly fire OR make it so the Steam Arachnids (and probably Swarms since they have the same debuff) are ignored by friendly models for Friendly Fire. The latter allows their Df debuff to be more useful throughout the faction as Versatile models while also completing a synergy with Ramos that isn't quite there but feels like it should be.

Anyway, my two scrip after testing. Thoughts?

Just noticed Rafkin lost Academic, not sure if that happened at the end of the CB or the beginning the OB, but does anyone have an idea why? I thought he allowed a bit of a functional Poison list to work with Sandeep. Did it break something?

Tried Joss in a Ramos list the over the weekend, and while he was a big distraction because my opponent kept remembering him from M2E, he feels underwhleming. Even when he can generate his own power tokens, pretty much everything on his card needs at least one to work, except his Command Construct, which is cool except it needs an 8 (or maybe a 9? I'm away from my cards) and a Tome to go off. I can live with that, though it'd be helpful if he could spend a power token for a suit.

Definitely agree that giving him Precise would help him feel worth his cost in both keywords.

Just a thought, since Thunders still tend to have more expensive pieces overall, but the ever versatile terracotta warrior seems solid for 4ss. How are Thunders Brothers looking these days?

39 minutes ago, retnab said:

In Blue there was a huge chart on all the discards and TN's required per Keyword and Chimera had WAAAAY more of each than any other Keyword, it wasn't even close.  So I'm on team "lower the discard/TN's" too

I was the guy who worked up that data, which is why I'm bringing this up. Someone else awesome turned the raw data into the chart though.

"Arcane Reservoir: Crews containing a model with this Ability increase their Maximum Hand Size by 1."

There's no longer a +1, so it doesn't stack.

Another point to bring up is due to the way Replace works, if Ramos summons Steam Arcahnids and then  they make a Swarm, the Swam itself attaches the summoning upgrade again, making it take half it's max wounds (if the original spiders have not been healed before swarming, it'll be coming in at 6/9 wounds, then take 4 wounds as half it's maximum) AND still be insignificant.

Overall, outside of Rekoning (and really, even there) summoning in only Insignificant models means it should be too easy to focus down/tie up all his hired models, meaning he can kill a bunch by exploding weak summons, but can't actually score points (i.e. play the game). I think at LEAST giving him a trigger to not have to attach his summoning upgrades to the steam Arachnids from a given summon action would help with this, but I agree right now, as much as I like Ramos, Sandeep is the clear choice to take, even despite all the differences since the closed beta.

It's expensive, but you're mostly spot on. The one thing is Arcane Reservoir has be set up so it doesn't stack, so no matter if you have one model with it or 4, you get +1 card in youax hand size unless all of those models die.

In general, going slow every turn to get stones will minimize the amount of attacking/scheming they will do, but you'll have to decide what is best for them to do every turn.

So between the Closed Beta and the Open Beta I have a few games with Marcus under my belt. One thing is consistent between all o f them: His crew is hungry. Hungry for cards.

Between TNs, suits for triggers that make the crew really work well, and discards, Chimera crews feel like they use the vast majority of their hand just to set up their special abilities, and have no good cards left to make sure attacks or terrifying checks actually work to make use of said special abilities/set ups.

My recommendations are to remove a few of the discards, and one TN, as the are the ones found on the models I feel will most often be taken in the crew, and will be the best way to balance the issues I've found with the crew.

For the discards: The Jackalope's demise ability and Marcus' Protection ability pretty easily combine to get three discards a turn. I recommend changing the Jackalope's Demise to be discarding an attached Mutation upgrade, even if it's only once per turn, this takes a little pressure off the Marcus player's hand and brings the Jackalope's number's down, while giving him a way to use the Mutation upgrades as a resource since he doesn't have Adaptive Evolution to make use of them actively.

Second: Shapechange. In M2E it made sense to discard a card for a full summon (and therefore effective full heal) of Vogel/The Beast Within. In M3E, a discard for a heal 2 for the Beast (who has no reliable ability better than Vogel offers the crew, with the same damage spread in Melee that Vogel has at range, with no ability to provide card draw to crew at this point desperately needs) feels a bit step. Myranda now has the ability to Shapechange back into herself after changing into a Beast for the same cost and heal 2 benefit, though changing into a Beast is a bonus action that requires a TN and keeps her from using the bonus action of whichever Beast she Replaces into that turn. I could see Shapechange be changed to just be an option at the start of the model's activation, keeping the Heal 2, minus the discard. I could also see the Beast Shape action on Myranda turning into a Shapechange (lesser cost Beast) for Myranda, which would make good use of the streamline focus of M3E. That removes 2 discards and a TN, as well as forcing Myranda to not split her actions between her different forms.

As a side point, the Beast Within could use a quick tweak to make changing into him worth the choice. Instead of the obviously option of upping him to min damage 3, I think building in the tome trigger on his attack to let him ignore armor would be the best option, as the crew has NO other way to deal with armor; it's a pretty hard counter to them. Other options are to build in his trigger on his roar to give a chance for enemy models to gain Adversary (Beast).

Finally, Hoarcats are the one Beast Marcus can hire which is negatively impacted when he hires it. Even the Blessed of December, the other Beast he can hire out of the Chimera theme in Arcanists, works the same in either crew. The Hoarcats Tundra Hunter ability could easily be updated to be "while within Aura 2 of an Ice Pillar *or friendly Chimera*" would fix this issue easily without allowing every crew to hire a Hoarcat with the bonus.

Anyway, my two cents. Anyone have similar thoughts or other options to suggest for Marcus and his furry friends?

While I generally like where Yan Lo and company are currently, I do wish Toshiro still had a way to summon Komainu as well as Ashigaru. I really feel like Komainu are getting the short end of the stick so far.

In corner especially, she can put Zombies pretty much right where she wants them. I really think it'd be better for the game if it defaulted to her summoning them in base contact (or within 6" or something) and if she got a trigger, on a board egde in LoS and...24"?  It's essentially the reverse of what she does now.

That would at least keep her from getting 4 zombies in each side corner turn 1 (which does take some resources, but they're so well spent there's every reason to do it).

33 minutes ago, retnab said:

The assist action really messes this up, but I suggested before that her defensive tech could be Distracted related. For example, models shes engaging cannot take the Concentrate action / benefit from Focused, enemy models affected by Distracted in duels targeting this model do not reduce their Distracted at the end of the duel, etc.?

I like some form of this idea as well, it reinforces her theme. Somewhat related, with Assist being an option for counterplay, I think Distracted could go back to it's original form from the initial beta announcement of negatives to attack and damage. I've found that as-is, Distracted is still best countered by Focus, but currently it means people hit normally with a positive to damage (normally ends up at a straight flip) which leads to Colette's crew, which pretty much lives by distracted, melting to cheated in severe damage.

2 minutes ago, WWHSD said:

I think that just making her unable to be targeted while buried if she buries herself would remove the hard counter without making her too strong against everything else. 

Now there's an idea! I'm not terribly learned on Tara, does that make Colette a reverse hard counter to her (I wouldn't think so since it's not the whole crew, but better to know).

My biggest concern with Ramos is his summon upgrade is terribly damning. Summons take irreduceable damage equal to half wounds (rounded down, thankfully), come in slow, and are insignificant. They do get an aura of auto 1 damage for enemies that activate nearby, which is cool, but I'm concerned that the way to beat Ramos is to focus down his hires and ignore his summons as much as possible so he has no/minimal models that can interact to actually win.

2nd issue with this, is the way replace works means when you combine steam Arachnids into a swarm, hypothetically the Arachnids are all summoned in on 2 wounds, so the swarm comes in at 6. Then it attaches the summoned upgrade since the little spiders had it, so it take half it's max damage (4) bringing it down to 2 wounds and still being insignificant. 

The insignificant part could be fixed by changing out his current trigger on his summoning (giving little spiders focused) for something similar to So'mer's where they don't attach the upgrade.

I'm honestly a little confused why his upgrade isn't just giving the summon's slow, like Sandeep's is. Anyone have any insight on that?

As an avid Colette player I agree something needs to be done: while there are ways around her defenses, as there should be, there's something to be said that they are so layered that if no one attacks her, she's way less effective, needing to spend resources to bury in order to pop up and spread distracted that everyone's so worried about (why aren't people using focus to counter it, I wonder?)

If she's such a problem, I recommend coming after her in less conventional ways as have been stated above, and giving other masters a boost. If she needs something changed, I'd say start by removing serene countenance and see where that leaves us.

That said, I think between Focus and the Assist action countering it, Distracted should be what it was originally, negatives to both attack and damage.

In the closed beta I played Toni a good bit and she definitely wants another M&SU nearby for unionized. She's less self sufficient, but her crew can support her and Mouse is free now, so it is what it is. My concern is that her Df trigger now defaults to "after succeding" since there's no other timing listed, so she's less able to defend herself (and more importantly, less able to get Adrenaline). 

Design-wise she's less of a tarpit not with smaller engagement range and no way to keep people from Disengaging, and I'm not terribly sure what she's supposed to do except draw enemies in and kill them before she dies.  Definitely a good counter-crew vs Terrifying though.

I'm interested to see how a wider testing pool finds her, though offhand I'd say her defensive trigger should flip back to After Resolving, lest she end up like pre-Wave 5 upgrades Toni.

As for the Gunsmiths, I'm glad they're fun and useful to use now. Not sure if they need a cost drop or not, but it would definitely make them a less obvious target for Vendetta, and more able to do it themselves.

49 minutes ago, Ludvig said:

Ayone got the inside scoop on what models Mei Feng will likely use often/always? Got her box obviously so apart from those.

In addition to her box, Mei makes good use of Metal Gamin and the Rail Golem (renamed the Metal Golem), Willie, as well as Sparks and the Mechanical Porkchop from the Bayou (haven't used Sparks yet and the MechChop seems like it might need a tweak, or maybe I just need to support it better). I expect Foundry will be getting new keyword models going forward, but for right now she does fine with the versatile models from her factions.

9 hours ago, Caedrus said:

Caedrus, checking in.

Here's my mid-month WIP of Mr Hodgepodge. Still lots to go!

I hope you're having a great month!

Caedrus.

Love the contrast between the oranges and his skin, and the levels in his skin in general (I hate doing skin, so seeing some that pops always makes me notice). Well done!

I'm so glad I held off on getting Dreamer previously. Cricket bat Dreamer is so much cooler. Chompy could loose a few pounds, but everyone else looks amazing!

Hopefully I'll get a bit more time today to do final touches on Manos and Waynudo, but probably won't have time  to upload pictures later, so, here're a final picture of Minako and her Katashiro for 18ss, with a WIP for the rest.

Happy New Year to everyone, be safe in whatever festivities you may attend, and may hope and good tidings find you quickly and often in 2019!