Jinn

Can you explain this? That action seems significantly better for Qi and Gong now that it discards a random card.

I'm pretty sure a lot of the Ressers think Belles are garbage, though they do appear significantly better than Showgirls.

"If a Marker is Dropped, it is simply put on the table in the indicated location without any further game effects; this is not considered moving the Marker." (pg. 28 CRB) I've played a decent number of Kaeris games (she's probably my favourite Master in Arcanists in an individual model sense) That seems about right in my experience, although if you lean into the keyword and hire all the fire elementals + Carlos I could see you needing more, but that'd be a rarity. Ideally Kaeris would drop two per turn, usually less though as you need a trigger. Most of her keyword are a bit under par at the moment but if you were hiring a thematic crew I would say their strength would be in using melee to defend a prepared position (wherever you put your pyre markers) and their weakness would be models that don't come and fight them on their turf (and, for the elementals, any form of condition removal can be very painful). The main weakness of the keyword is that most of the models seem to want Kaeris to sit around and waste her Pyres on them, just to bring them up to par with other models defensively. This is a painful choice because Kaeris is best used aggressively pressuring the enemy with her Pyres and Run and Gun. Many Kaeris players have just scrapped the Keyword models that rely on her support and switched to Versatiles for this reason. If you want to take thematic models and still remain somewhat competitive then the Fire Golem, Carlos, and the Firestarter are all decent, and taking one Firebranded for healing is fine as well. Carlos is great at scheming and offers a good teleport target for the Fire Golem. The Firestarter is made of glass and will get more fragile as you use Reckless, but he can do some good scheming if you keep him out of attack range and when you're ready for him to die he can do a bit of damage as well with his gun. I don't know exactly what of these is obvious, but here are a few tips. Her main attack, which is min 3 against burning targets, is min 2 against Armor +2 models and min 1 against Incorporeal models due to the trigger creating a separate instance of damage. Not exactly a trick, but Kaeris can be very countered by Incorporeal crews, even though they don't get to ignore her hazardous. If you create a Pyre and then charge into it you get the burning from resolving the charge before you take the action generated by the charge, which you can then use foron the attack. It is usually worth it to end your activation in a Pyre with burning as you'll probably be able to get rid of it as aon df. The Magical Training upgrade is pretty great on Kaeris though as it will block the 1 burning damage you might take if your opponent doesn't attack you after you end in a pyre. Shielded is great with Armor anyway. It is obvious and not really a trick but the Eternal Flame can really screw up crews that are bubbled together. The threat range on this thing moving a Pyre marker on top of an enemy is pretty insane; it can move 10" and then target a Pyre from 10" away and place it anywhere within 3". As a follow up to Kaeris hitting her blast trigger or just her putting a Pyre kind of near enemies this thing will almost always be putting hazardous under something (usually multiple somethings) on turn 1 or 2 and it can follow up with a big of TN13 Mv duel or 1 dmg + 1 burning. Other than MT on Kaeris, I liked Soulstone Cache on Elijah until I stopped bringing him, and Magical Training on a Firebranded if you aren't hiring Soulstone Miners. Diesel Engine is a great upgrade but not really worth it on the Eternal Flame, which is the only thematic construct. I'd take a decent amount of stones as you'll need them for the quick reflexes trigger on her bonus action and keeping the Firestarter alive if you take him.

The wording of minimum 5, 4, & 3 damage being necessary to damage the shielded +3 Librarian makes me think he may be playing with the old beta shielded, otherwise why mention those numbers?

How so? Shielded only reduces damage by 1, so doing 3 damage should always be wounding a Librarian, no matter their shielded, unless I'm missing something.

It's in the Waldo's weekly. The last paragraph of the poem has a hyperlink that leads to this image.

Other than the obvious nerfs that are probably needed for Shenlong/Kitty Dumont/Minako Rei, here is what I would want in an Errata: The Lone Swordsman's Last Breath action could probably use "This Action cannot target the same model more than once per Activation." as a restriction, as he is very good even without to attack and damage, and generating 2 stones on kill (that 8 irreducible damage is a real doozy if you screw it up though). I think Youko needs a lot of help personally, but I know quite a few people feel that she's fine as she is. I think most of her models are okay (Kabuki Warriors) to excellent (Hinamatsu, Kunoichi) but they are let down by Youko herself. I admit, until she's got the rest of her models and is played in big tournaments I can't really draw any useful conclusions beyond my personal experience with her. That withstanding, if she is weak then here is where I think she needs a buff: Youko's survivability. She is absolutely shredded by focus and most of her actions/auras are relatively low range. Giving her back disguised would go a long way to keeping her alive an extra turn or so to do her aura shenanigans while leaving her with a weakness to ranged. Blackmail is pretty damn weak against a smart player who is familiar with her (outside of niche actions, which I think are their own problem). It is effectively a stat 6, range 6", non-inbuilt Obey that has the upside of getting two pass tokens and both the downside of being unable to target friendlies, and the downside that your opponent can block it by discarding two cards (rarely will this be the better choice but, because it is up to them, a good opponent will usually use this option to their advantage, not yours). Viewing it in this light I don't think it would be unreasonable to get the inbuilt and/or to increase the range to 12". Lust desperately needs a more consistent sin mechanic. If it was draw or discard then it would be significantly closer to the other Crossroads' models in terms of consistency. Card draw on a model is relatively rare and definitely not something you would want to be giving your opponent more of. Also, how does Lust not have a Lure!? Ruffians need to have a role in McCabe's crew. Make them enable the rest of the crew somehow (some upgrade juggling synergy maybe) or make them annoying to the enemy in some way and make them tanky enough to take a hit. Alternatively, drop their cost to 4SS and they might begin to compete with Hucksters.

Concentrating on the lower end of things... Oxfordian Mages, Shastar Vidiya Guards and Firebranded all need a reason to hire more than one of them. I don't know if it's because of pass tokens or just because the models are subpar, but it really sucks when you have three sculpts of a model and you have to go out of your way to use even one in the keyword they're designed for. Kaeris's crew needs more ways to generate Pyre Markers for friendly purposes or else I'm just going to hire versatile models that don't need her to waste her hazardous on your own side of the board AND activate before most of her crew. Fire Gamin especially are almost useless without support, and who hires 4SS minions to support them with your master? Elijah Borgmann could really use stat 6 on his expunge and some kind of extra movement (rush would work). Most of the beasts probably need to be looked over. Specifically, the ones I'd almost never hire: Moleman Order Initiate Slate Ridge Mauler Hoarcat Cojo Most of them become half decent when Marcus puts his upgrades on them but once that happens they ought to be well above the curve as that is where most of Marcus's impact as a master is going. Showgirls need a defence other than Manipulative, the whole idea of combining it with distracted to be unhittable just doesn't work in practice due to their low wound count and the ease with which you can remove distracted using assist. They usually die in one focused charge even if you leave them to activate until last. The most important Errata I can think of though is giving the Arcane Emissary Blade Rush. I mean look at those pointy arm blades; I've had to transport them dozens of times, and for what! Seriously though, I would like to see a way for the Emissary to ignore terrain somehow or to destroy destructible terrain it comes into contact with during a move. With how dense terrain is supposed to be with GG0 there is often only a couple of places on the board where you can get a full charge with a 50mm base. This I wholly agree with. On multiple occasions I've hired a December crew to fit the matchup and schemes, gotten to Snow Storm's activation and then suddenly realised that their bonus action is going to go almost entirely to waste as I've only got the Wendigo to use it on. Letting it target any December model wouldn't be the end of the world, would it? On the other side of things, I think the Soulstone Miner and the Steam Arachnid Swarm could use a nerf. I am worried that Wyrd might just nerf the versatile models without buffing any of the keyword models which would leave those Masters with a weak keyword in a difficult position though.

I've always thought of the bar as health equal to cost +1 for a vanilla model. I think a lot of the problem with Marcus's crew and the Order Initiates could be solved by increasing the rare limit on the mutation upgrades. I find it really hard to justify an Order Initiate just on the grounds that they can give themselves upgrades when the upgrades I'd most want them to have would be better served on a Cerberus, Scorpius, or Blessed.

Youko is my pick for the worst master in the game.

They would take 1 less damage though because they couldn't declare the action generated by the charge.

Also the Riders all have ride with me, which is an insanely good bonus action. It gives a bunch of extra movement to the Rider (which can also get them out of engagements, though the Yasunori can often do this too) as well as what is often better than an extra walk for another model. You could easily trade both of the Yasunori's bonus actions for Ride With Me and bump his cost up to 11SS and I would hire him over his current incarnation, which makes me think that the Riders in general are probably a bit overtuned. I guess having access to this kind of movement might have different balance considerations in a faction that has other easy ways of moving models around though.

Yep. I never managed to win another Youko game after she got nerfed. Oh yeah, Leverage gaveto all duels per enemy revealed scheme back then as well. Fun times.

Didn't you vehemently oppose nerfing Hinamatsu during the beta when she had 7 Df, a 2/4/5 damage track and Finesse? You may be unbiased, but you can definitely be wrong about stuff. Your metrics for balance being just podium placements since release are going to have big problems with a game that has a meta. If Shen dominated the next four (moderately sized) tournaments and grabbed all podiums, but then came dead last in the next two tournaments it would indicate people had figured out a counter to him, but by your metrics he would be first in line for nerfs. Older tournaments should, by default, have less weight than more recent tournaments when it comes to determining balance. I don't think anyone is seriously expecting Wyrd to nerf Shenlong based on the outcome of two tournaments this early into the meta. When people say he is broken they're just predicting that he will continue to dominate tournaments, and should that come to pass he should be nerfed. I also highly doubt that anyone wants just Shen to be nerfed. It is obvious that balance is off in Arcanists given the prevalence of Soulstone Miners and SA Swarms in people's lists, same as Ressers with Archie or Bayou with BBB. I personally hope Errata are frequent, and comes with buffs and nerfs to plenty of models.

Not all tournaments are created equal though. Wasn't this the biggest one so far? Additionally, as the meta develops people will figure out the best models and lists which ought to mean that more recent tournaments are more optimized and should be given more weight. If TT dominate the next two tournaments it would definitely be worrying from a balance standpoint because people ought to be adapting to Shen, even though by your metric they would be at 4/15 tournaments and would be behind Arcanists.

How aggressively did you play Misaki? Did you play it safe and unbury late, or did you go in on an isolated model early, or what?

Am I wrong in thinking this is primarily a Shenlong issue rather than a Monk issue? Apparently the 1st place Shenlong player hired almost entirely out of keyword. If Chi is nerfed rather than Shenlong without those other Monks getting a look at then the rest of the keyword might become really bad.

Youko can't really discard your cards that well if you don't let her. The only way she herself can force you to discard your cards is with a trigger on her bonus action (so once a turn) which will discard two random cards until you reveal your schemes. Her action that allows you to either discard two cards or let her gain two pass tokens? Give her the tokens every time unless she gets the obey trigger and it's a potentially devastating action. Youko is really easy to kill, especially with adversary. I'd definitely take two copies of the intuition upgrade (one on Kirai, one on a Goryo maybe) to mitigate the lack of a hand, but I assume you've got it stapled to Kirai's card already for summoning. Charm Warders are very scary (they also have the discard trigger, and anti-summoning tech) so I'd focus fire on them. For Distracted just concentrate to get around it, none of Youko's models are hard to wound so you should be able to kill them pretty easily with focus. Youko is IMO rather bad because she is very easy to play around. Her opponent dictates whether or not they reveal their schemes or choose to give her pass tokens so once you figure out the best line of play against her she folds due to underwhelming stats.

If you compare it to similar models around the same cost it seems pretty insane even with 5 wounds. Why they tacked on that extra wound above the norm of health = cost for Armour +1 models I do not know. Most Keywords would kill for a model with a built in leap, let alone a tanky cheap one with Entropy and card draw.

The Scorpius is (IMO) one of the few beasts that is good for its cost before upgrades (along with the Cerberus and Blessed), which makes it great in a Marcus crew. If your opponent can't ignore armour then you can put it up to armour +2 and it becomes very difficult to kill. It has extra movement, ceaseless advance, armour, stat 7, poison (and the poison damage aura), and can turn off stoning and triggers. I would consider it close to an autotake for any Marcus list.

How do you deal with the burning generated by the Forgeling? Or do you go with it first and then try to cleanse Kang? I really wish that stupid Fiery Presence ability was optional. It is so damn annoying having to worry about it during deployment. More generally, how do people like the Metal Golem? It seems... lackluster to me for a 10SS Keyword model. Stat 5on a model with only 2AP (no flurry or whatever) is generally pretty bad compared to many other beaters (even the Arcane Emissary has Shove Aside rather than Knock Aside, which can almost be a 3rd AP some of the time). Is the Off The Rails action good enough to make up for these deficiencies? My main concern with it is that on the boards I usually play on a 6" push on a 50mm is almost never going to get you where you want to go without ignoring terrain. It would be amazing if models like the Metal Golem had some ability that destroyed destructible terrain of lower Sz on contact during pushes. It is really disappointing when your gigantic charging ton of steel is stopped dead by a Sz 1 crate.

No, only walks.

I only have a real problem with it on models with decent health or another defence. Masters with Butterfly Jump that have 10+ wounds, can stone, and usually have another defence on top of that are a bit too much. Shenlong is (probably) the most egregious example, but I despise that Neverborn upgrade nonetheless.

I believe a lot of people consider Shenlong to be overtuned. That's mostly Shenlong the master, not so much Thunder Archers though (or I haven't heard much grumbling about them specifically). Despite this, I'd recommend Steam Arachnid Swarms with Diesel Engine to deal with those Archers. They have more wounds than their cost, which is very useful against the Monk's Irreducible, and also have Armour +1 which drains Monk resources to ignore. They will likely kill a Thunder archer in a single charge. They can move up 13" and still have an AP left (On The Move 3" + Nimble 5" + regular walk 5") which makes their charging threat range ~19", all Unimpeded. While in base contact with a model they also lower its defence by 1, which means that after chi they're at Stat 6 vs. Df 6 against a Thunder Archer (and any Monk I think). This thing would still be gobbled up by Shenlong, but only after it has killed at least one Archer. It also loves scrap markers for healing which is great in a Mei Feng crew. Two of these things would certainly help your chances IMO, but Shenlong is still really nasty.

"Auras are not cumulative. If a model would be affected by multiple Auras of the same name (i.e., if the Aura would change its game state in some way), then it is only affected by one such Aura of its controller’s choice." pg 30 The Recharge Soulstone aura doesn't affect the model that dies at all, so you can stack it. This works similarly to the Life Leech aura, in which the aspect of it that affects models (the damage) only triggers from one model, but any number of models with Life Leech can heal off of one model activating.