Boomstick

Agreed that Fae minions have some cost issues. I'm not sure what to do about them as a whole, since the Knights have a lot of defensive tech, but Bultungin definitely have the oddity of being fast (mv6) scheme runners who will generally be running solo, but have Pack Mentality...? They seem like the minion who could best be tweaked to help both Fae and Savage with this issue.

I feel like a couple small tweaks to the schemes might help keep pools like this from cropping up: Take Prisoner could be any enemy model, Hold Up and Vendetta could be equal or higher cost models, etc.

5 minutes ago, Cuilion said:

Did you try combining with the Midnight Stalker? I did not try that yet but potentially he can give the Vics positives in each duel... 

I did not, and that's good to know, but I don't think an 8ss tax model for potential help is the answer.

Had a game vs Seamus which really highlighted some of the issues with the Viks. They really do feel like scheme runners that can occasionally hit things. The stat 7 is great, but with absolutely no way to get positives except Focus, they actually had a good amount of trouble hitting things without draining their hand.

This was highlighted with the way Redchapel Killer currently allows Seamus to automatically gain plus flips to his melee attacks because it doesn't specify targets engaged by "other" friendly Redchapel models. He could hit everything without issue or need to cheat. Four times a turn if needed, with how Cause for Celebration works.

Personally, I think changing East & West to allow the Viks to get positive flips to all attacks while further than 6" away from the other Vik would help a lot without worrying about leading to a ridiculous number of attacks between the two of them (and allow for different playstyles of either the current teamwork movement/chain activation, or separate battle sisters), as well as allowing the final surviving Vik to feel more deadly, not just a little more survivable.

Also, I feel like Taelor could use another less situational bonus action, maybe I've Got Your Back or Challenge?

On 2/15/2019 at 8:47 AM, Diddick said:

@Boomstick You're gonna be busy...   How did you do the bases?? are they made with green stuff rolling pins?   Also, looking forward to see more pics of the converted talos

Busy indeed! The bases are rubber stamps from Happy Seppuku, trying them out on air drying clay this time. Not sure how I feel about it so far, but the stamps themselves are great!

Having played against Seamus and friends many times in the closed and open beta, it's rewarding to see them get to a pretty good spot overall. Belles could use something, though I'm not sure what, exactly.

Seamus could use some sort of tweak on his healing, a very small one, maybe max healing of 4 over the course of a turn instead of once per activation?

There's two things I've seen from the recent games against hin need a slight tweak downward: Redchapel Killer and Cause for Celebration.

Redchapel Killer currently gives Seamus and the CCK positive flips in melee when they're the only engaging Redchapel models. All this needs is to be changed to "...targeting an enemy engaged by another friendly Redchapel model..." which would also help encourage his crew to work together and Seamus not be such a no-brainer second master.

Cause for Celebration, from my experience, has not been an issue due to his gun, but rather that it gives him auto-fast (when all other masters cannot get a 4th action). I think giving it a TN needing a 9 would he enough, and/or requiring it to be an action on his card. I've had several games with him that have been won/lost due to walk/interact/walk/interact or teleport/interact/walk/interact turns by him, and it feels very sour even when you know he can do it. Requiring a decently high card or requiring the Celebration action to be an action on his card would still be very powerful for him, just require a little more planning by the Seamus player to get the best use of 4 actions a turn.

4 hours ago, thewrathchilde said:

NO...please don't take away Onslaught. Unless Cojo is completely re-tooled having this on the Upgrade that can go on Cojo is the only thing that even remotely gives him a prayer of being useful. 

I haven't tried Cojo personally (mostly because he seems too expensive for what he does except in maybe specific circumstances), but from other reports I've read on here it sounds like he could use a re-work anyway. Honestly, if he needs a specific mutation to be worth it, on top of needing a specific suit, I'd say he needs the re-work regardless.

13 hours ago, Passenty said:

It really iritates me that once engage the push cant declare trigger because the trigger has no "even when engaged clause", so basically you need to transfer 2 master ap for one charge action if the beast is in combat.

The best thing I found to help with this is to use his bonus action to get his nearby beasts out of engagement, then use call of the wild for extra charges. Essentially his activation after turn one was Chimirancy to reattach an upgrade used by the beast in question (with the trigger to do it again to another target if possible), then his bonus Primal Roar to move them out of engagement, then have two of them charge. It worked pretty well.

However, that still means, every turn, to feel effective (since that's really all he can do) he needs between a 5-9 (probably a 7) for Chimirancy, preferably a mask for the trigger, then another 5-9 for the 2nd one. Then, a 5 for Primal Roar, then two 6s for two Calls of the Wild. The TNs aren't high, but they're on literally everything he does. And, by making the charge on Call of the Wild a trigger, it prevents triggers from the charge attacks, which is going to keep the beasts alive in many cases.

If Onslaught is the concern there, remove it from Thick Horns for Armor Piercing or something. Overall, Marcus would feel more beastmaster than beastannoyer if Call of the Wild made the target take an action.

Tried out Marcus and friends again last night and, as a whole, they're in a much better place than when I last tried them. The additional card draw from Marcus' aura when a Mutation is discarded really helps, and it had me more actively setting up times to discard mutations for the and suite. So, primary concern of card hunger is at least somewhat helped. I still wouldn't want to discard terribly often, and have concerns about one or two models.

The Cerberus did well, but was not MVP: it's a model that can do decently solo and has the mobility, so I didn't keep it near Marcus to keep attaching new upgrades. Essentially, it got one big hit off and then went to hunting scheme runners.

On the other hand, the Slate Ridge Mauler was amazing. With some help from Marcus and a few lucky flips vs Terrifying, it ate Archie (side point, playing him into Molly is hilarious. He can block LoS so Marcus can ignore Lethe's Caress, while the bear itself actually enjoys taking the damage from it so he gets to his Grit faster, then heals in one of a few different ways.)

My remaining concerns are that Vogel still has no reliable trick he can do as the Beast that warrants discarding a card to shapeshift, and as he can't maintain a mutation through shapeshifting, he can't discard them for the suits, which would allow him to reliably use the Beast's more interesting triggers.

Considering Shapeshift could be better streamlined between Vogel and Myranda anyway to allow for a Mutation to be kept and to free up a bonus action on Myranda's card, if that change was made and the Beast was Given Adaptive Evolution (and Vogel wasn't) that would solve both issues with two minor changes.

So Myranda would lose her Beast Shape bonus action and gain an ability like: "Shapechange (lesser cost in-faction Beast): At the 
start of this model's Activation, it may Heal 2 and Replace itself 
with a lesser cost Beast from the crew's declared faction, keeping one attached Mutation upgrade." And Vogel and the Beast's Shapechange would follow suit, but state their other half instead of the lesser cost Beast. Then give The Beast Within Adaptive Evolution.

The other concern I had from the crew I tested was that Order Initiates are either too expensive for their cost, or aren't given enough tech for their cost. Yes they get a free Mutation and can cycle them without Marcus' help, but that does not make up for their otherwise mediocre stats. For a single stone more I'd much rather take another Cerberus or Mauler. I don't think they need much, but Df 6, or maybe Hard to Wound (to show their anatomy is in flux) would go a long way. Otherwise, dropping them to 6ss might be enough?

Still annoyed that the Hoarcats are the only Beast negatively affected by being hired into a Chimera crew, but didn't actively test them last night since nothing on them has changed since my previous tests. Also have never tested Cojo as he currently just doesn't interest me for his cost: again, for 2 stones less I can take a Mauler or a Cerberus.

Overall, much happier with the crew, the game was fun this time instead of white-knuckle wondering where all my cards had gone. Just a few tweaks to make and I think they'll he ready to print.

With the most recent change to Stunned, she can, since Stunned disallows triggers, but allows bonus actions to be taken, they just count against the model's normal action count.

10 minutes ago, Ritzititz said:

They shouldnt last forever and the Range of her spells must at least be halved

They don't last forever, they're Destrucable. So, any model with Demolitionist or Blow It To Hell wrecks her day, or if you have numerous models that don't do much else (rats, doves, etc) they can use their turns destroying nearby pillars. Raspy, like most control masters, makes you do a spit-take the first time you see her, but you just have to bring the right tools to effectively turn her off.

As someone who had Brewie as my first master in M2E, he's in a much easier to use place now. You honestly should be fine with his crew box, some Tanuki, and the Whiskey Golem, to start with.

After that, I'd say get/split the Backdraft box to get his new Henchman and Enforcer, as well as the Whiskey Gamin, which are also fluffy, fun, and useful.

Akaname and Fermented River Monks.may also be useful from what I've read your, but have not yet tried them.

The several games with McCabe I've played have been pretty fun overall. Looted Supplies definitely seems a bit situational as a keyword ability, and I tend to view the upgrades as more of a "make sure you get the one or two that you need against the crew you're facing" instead of the entire point of McCabe for the game. It's not like M3E where he was juggling them all all game.

53 minutes ago, retnab said:

So I've been reading through the batreps again, and I've noticed that in almost every single Marcus game the Cerberus is noted as being the MVP.  Have you all been finding that?  Do you think it's the Cerberus is that good, or the others are that bad?  Meaning, do you think it needs a bit of a nerf or its competition need a bit of a buff?

I've noticed the Cerberus is functional without a ton of help. Not over the top, it still needs cards and good placement to support  it, but otherwise it's good. The mutations are nice, but not needed for it to work. Whereas most other Chimera minions need them to feel even functional.

While I've been missing that Brewie is no longer in TT, it hasn't made me like the faction any less, and I'll definitely be play testing them more going forward now that Arcanists are more or less in a decent spot, barring a few that need a tweak here or there.

As far as models, I'm concerned about the TC Warriors not having the mask built in on Mold of the Other. I feel like that's what you take them for and currently you're hoping you get a decently high mask and then hold on to it until something you can copy dies.

37 minutes ago, Fetid Strumpet said:

But I notice from most reports no one is really enjoying Colette in her current form, 

In this, I agree. The bury as well as her overstacked defenses makes her non-interactive for both players. I actually really like your ideas for Shell Game and the no cheating on ranged attacks against her.

I'll definitely be giving them more battle reports over the next two weeks as Kyle rightfully suggested. Not just of Colette, but she's definitely my focus, since Mei seems pretty locked it, Kaeris was fun when I played her three updates ago and she's gotten so she requires less setup. Toni I think could still use a little work to actually lock people down instead of just killing them either slowly or spending a lot of Adrenaline to do it (when she doesn't gain much for the number of ways she can use it). Marcus and Chimera I think still need some tweaks, so I'll be testing them as well - I just really want Marcus to feel interesting and for Vogel to have a reliable reason to shapeshift.

6 minutes ago, lusciousmccabe said:

You'll be busy!

Very true, if I get them all done. I tend to throw a bunch of thing on my tray to work on all at once, and then finish them up one at a time once I get to details. So it rarely works out that everything gets done in a given month.

Oh, forgot the biggest thing in the picture: I've tweaked the Talos model a little bit and it's going to become conversion of Killjoy in much more appropriate aesthetics for the Autumn Queen's court.

Such happenings at the start of this month I forgot to post my To-Do picture! Fixing that now.

Mostly painting up some Neverborn bits and bobs (Adze, Wisp, 2x Silurids, Iggy, Bultungin, an Autumn Knight) with a few neglected Gremlins (Sparks, a Gatreaux Bokor, a Lightning Bug), and the Hodgepodge Effigy and the Student of Conflict, because why not.

3 minutes ago, WWHSD said:

I think the Beast needs something like Leap with a trigger to make a attack to really make him shine.  I wouldn't mind seeing his attack pick up a trigger that gives the target Adversary (Beast) Maybe Vogel a Demise ability that lets him replace himself with The Beast (in addition to the shape shift) and Heal 2.  Since Vogel kind of supports the crew by boosting their Defenses, maybe The Beast could work as a model that buffs the offensive ability of the crew.

As for things The Beast currently does that Vogel doesn't, it is kind of nice to use The Beats Bonus action in conjunction with Marcus's to move the crew 6".  

All good ideas, thank you for the insight!

I'm a bit concerned that, to my mindset at least, everything the Beast does that needs a specific trigger actually requires 2 cards: one to discard to shift, the other to get the trigger. 

The bonus action is nice, but would be way more helpful to the crew offensively as you said, if the trigger for the chance at giving Adversary was built in. Or, personally, if his attack had the trigger to ignore armor built in, as the crew currently has no other way to deal with it.

I don't know, hopefully I get a chance to test them in this next week.

I've been worried about Marcus' crew for a while, and I think the changes recently have helped (but I have yet to test them personally). Buuuuuut, I'm still concerned about our favorite dapper lycanthrope.

To clarify, Vogel seems in a wonderful spot, I'm not even upset about the price increase, he's solid. My concern is the Beast side of him seems...decent, but not reliably good enough in different ways than Vogel to shift into except as a way to heal a few wounds.

He has the same damage track in Melee as Vogel has at range. There are are some interesting and helpful triggers on it, but none built in, and the issue I'd had previously is it already costs a discard to shift shapes, and then you'd need a suit for the trigger to do the things that make him special (whether on his attack or tactical action).

Especially before the most recent Chimera crew changes, Vogel's card draw was the one thing keeping the crew functional in my games.

Has anyone had some insightful experiences on this? Am I missing something the Beast does reliably better?

I'd been thinking that Shapeshifting could drop the card discard without being too powerful (maybe even give Myranda the ability Shapeshifting (lesser cost in-faction Beast) and add in the bit about her upgrade to change back instead of her bonus action to streamline it between the two of them. I'm not sure that's needed to save cards now with the changes, but again, haven't tested yet. Thoughts?

14 minutes ago, Gnomezilla said:

...she has not. Mostly from being in the same faction as Ironsides. But I see what mechanics you’re trying to model with the unfluffy name of Challenge and I think you might be onto an idea which would lessen the need for Colette to pile on headachey amounts of Distracted for crew protection. Maybe it goes to her henchmen instead?

I like that idea, with the caveat that if goes on Cassandra, her bonus action should be a negative on all attacks, not just melee. She's decent as is, but with a challenge-esque aura forcing more eyes her way, she'd need a bit extra survivability.

And Carlos is no longer the Performer tank so the niche is open...

1 hour ago, Fetid Strumpet said:

I mean I don’t think that Idea is any better. I doubt I’d ever target her even with your suggestion, and she’s still be utterly immune to melee.

The concept wanting to get attacked just really doesn’t work. The resources required to ensure a successful attack means you aren’t going to do it if it doesn’t progress your goal or give you some meaningful benefit. 

The only way that kind of idea has ever worked is if it still does what the opponent wants, but gives the attacked model a small benefit as well, but not enough so that the opposing model doesn’t want to attack her,

Last edition’s Do You Know Who I Am was a good example. It made Seamus want to be near his terror causing models because he could fire the effect off any successful horror check, and it would do some amount of dmg for doing so, and possibly raise his own terror score. So if he was close by you had to weigh not attacking at all, bad, or attacking and getting a small punishment once a turn. But it could also be played around. You could be out of range, you could reposition, you could try to get the ability to fire on the model you choose before running in with your other models.

I mean if the developers are wedded to the idea of Colette being someone who gets benefits for being attacked then my suggestion would be to give her a reverse protected, where she could swap herself for one of her Showgirls, and this get to fire her trigger or ability, but the opponent still has to get value out of their attack or they just won’t attack anything instead of just not attacking Colette.

Here's a radical idea: a master illusionist should be perfectly able to avoid an incoming attack so long as they have the resources to hold an illusion. Not every master needs to be able to targeted directly and it be a meaningful attack. In fact, to make every master that straightforward would make the game far less interesting, and remove a large reason it separates itself from other wargames.

With my suggestion (or something like it), Colette is not immune to attacks, she merely has the option to avoid some, and doing so is a choice of a card for her or a card for her crew to be effective. Keeping her on the table instead of burying means the opponent has the option to keep attacking, to keep her making the decision to discard or not. Given that we know Distracted is not keeping anyone in Colette's crew (or anywhere else) alive except herself if the opponent focuses and charges, I personally think Distracted needs a change, but this isn't the thread for that discussion.

If this change were made, it becomes the Colette player's responsibility to put her somewhere the opponent  has to attack her, in order to protect the rest of her crew. Locking down a beater or other key piece in engagement, etc. Maybe she needs something so it's harder to ignore her, like wicked. As I said, my suggestion isn't a complete solution, it would need to be tested, but just keeping Colette on the table instead of burying makes it more interactive, which is currently the biggest issue I've had playing her since the change to a trigger: She's still not terribly fun to play against, and now she's also not terribly fun to play, since her defenses have so many counters she can't reliably be up front to actually try and soak attacks. The perfect solution won't be done in one step, it will take time and testing to get there, so let's take a step.

I appreciate that you appear to like a straightforward approach to the game, but Colette does not have that either playing her or against her, and in my humble opinion, she shouldn't. Even if she goes back to being (if she chooses to be) immune to direct damage, blasts (which Seamus' crew has in Sybelle), shockwaves, blade rush, and several other forms of indirect damage work fine. More importantly, it's easier to attack a player's hand (even by forcing them to cheat on other things) and then attack Colette directly if you feel the need.

32 minutes ago, Saduhem said:

This is why I don't like that both distracted and injured lead to a bunch of failed duels during the affected model's activation, especially considering about 6 common sources of stacking -flips in the game.

Control without having to kill is great, but making people flip cards with no outcome is a waste of time in a 3 hour long game. Flipping =\= playing.

Between the stacking negative flips and the reduced stats during duels in a game where going from 4 to 5 is life or death, it just promotes games where your best bet is to leave the opponent alone and not bother performing opposed duels.

 

I completely agree there are some condition changes that would be healthy for the game, and provide less bookkeeping. More interactivity makes for more fun in the game, even when you're not winning, you can joke around with your opponent. When you're both beating your head against the cards because they are no longer able to make your crew effective, it's a sad, un-fun experience.

1 minute ago, DamnDaemon said:

That sounds like very reasonable and interesting changes.

I'm currently teaching a friend how to play Malifaux and she picked Colette as her first master. She likes the game so far and is still getting used to all the rules and interactions, but is learning pretty quickly. I'm interested to hear her opinion on the matter as a whole and regarding your ideas for changes.

Thank you! Colette was my 2nd master (got Brewie first because her box wasn't out yet) and definitely most played/favorite, so I'm definitely trying to make sure she's in a good spot. 

Excited to hear what your friend thinks of her and my idea!

Completely agree that her not being targeted is not fun for either player, and should change.

In my bat rep forms I've been pointing out both that her defenses are either near perfect or tissue paper thin, and that she wants to be attacked so she can bury and hand out Distracted/Stunned means she wants to he attacked. It makes for a big anti-synergystic mess where she's apparently supposed to be the protector of her crew, since they melt to most focused attacks, even with Distracted in play.

I've been trying to minimize bringing it up on the forums since Colette seems to be rather polarizing, and letting the batreps do the talking.

I'd recommend putting in batrep forms and mention (as appropriate for each game) how she either wasn't attacked because the opponent brought nothing to deal with her specifically, or she was relegated to the back lines and wasn't terribly fun or effective (or died horribly) when the opponent brought stunned, attacks that ignore resistance triggers, irreduceable damage, or the old standbys of indirect damage (of which there are many more in M3E than in M2E).

My biggest issue, honestly, is burying her is not interactive with your opponent. I think her Fade Away trigger should be an ability where she discards a card to place within 6" or so when targeted, and LoS/range is drawn from the new position. Make it so she hands out a single distracted to an enemy within 3" of her landing position  when placed, maybe. It's more interactive, allows your opponent to attack your hand if not Colette's Wds directly (which is rather thematic for a master illusionist), and forces the Colette player to decide how many cards they need on a turn for their crew to be effective. If the Mannequins were tough enough to actually Take The Hit, that requires a card too, so giving them an extra armor or something would also lead to discard decisions.

I'm sure that it would need further work, but that'd be a decent place to start, I think. Still leaves her vulnerable to indirect damage and clever board presence by the opponent without giving her tissue paper armor. Might be able to remove Serene Countenance too, since that's a big part of no one wanting to target her.

Most of these updates Invert much enjoy, think are good for the game, and are fun.

My concern is still Colette's defensive tech being a trigger. You've done wonderful on making her doves more relevant to her in a way that makes her less likely to be taken as a secondary master all the time, but the just highlights even more the weaknesses of her resistence trigger.

In addition to the indirect damage that has always been a Hallmark of how to hurt her, the trigger opens her up to Stunned (of which there is a lot throughout the game), irreduceable damage, and attacks which disallow resistance triggers (which are a cool addition/expansion to the game as a whole, but are making her easier and easier to kill). Defensively, she's gone from being an amazing illusionist to a very bad one. This reminds me of the issues from post-Wave 4 and Wave 5 M2E, where she really couldn't be taken into games against Gremlins, Guild, and a little bit Out ass and Thunders, except not it's more widespread.

Looking at how she wants to function, her defensive tech is at odds with itself. She wants to he targeted so she can bury and pop out to pulse out Distracted. But,  Serene Countenance is very powerful (but not very thematic in my opinion) and with either Fade Away or her current trigger, it combines so the opponent is never going to attack her if they know what she does. (I'm very open with my opponents on how things work in my crews. Throughout the closed and open betas, I've seen her directly targeted three times total.)

Yes, she can bury herself with her sword with more resources and ensuring she hits with her bonus action, but that's beside the point: pulsing out Distracted without any resistence feels bad to the opponent (no matter how ineffective Distracted is after using Focus), Burying Colette keeps her too safe from most crews but lead to Serene Countenace being added to help her against crews that attack buried models, and if she's not targeted, she doesn't bury.

So, why not:

- Remove Serene Countenance.

- Make Showstopper "Whenever this model is Placed, it may choose one enemy model within 4 Distracted +1."

- Replace her resistance trigger with an ability. "Smoke and Mirrors: when this model is targeted by an attack action, it may discard a card to place within 6". LoS and range are drawn from the new location. If this model is no longer a valid target for the attack, the action fails."

Yes, this would allow her to go back to being harder to actually damage, But, it keeps her on the table, so where she is placed becomes a key question for the Colette player: does she go where she can hand out the free Distracted, or where she can't be seen? How many more times can she allow the opponent to make her discard before her crew can't ensure they have cards needed to be effective? It allows the opponent to attack her hand directly instead of her health. Most importantly, it's thematic while also having interesting counterplay. There's plenty of masters who care if you damage them from direct attacks. Let Colette continue to be a little different.

Don't get me wrong, I'll be continuing to test her, thank you Kyle and Matt for the updates this week, they are stellar overall, this is the one big point that has me concerned.

Agreed on Hoarcats, in addition, their multiple ways of healing seem counter intuitive since it's based on killing, which based on their damage track, they won't be doing much of. Tundra Hunter helps with that a little, though I still think it needs to change to within 2" of an ice pillars or friendly Beast and/or Chimera, so the Hoarcats can help Marcus out as well (they're currently the only non-Chimera Beast he has access to that gets worse in his crew because their effectiveness is tied tightly to ice pillars through that ability). More of a Chimera crew thing, but it's a tweak that model could use, and that's really the only model in December I think isn't in a great place.