Jinn

Joss with Blade and Claw made into a beast by a Malifaux Raptor seems like a good choice for Virulent, he could also take Bleeding Edge Tech for the Poison Gamin and Scorpius. Canine Remains have infect and the -1 Wp + Beast characteristic trigger, so they already have synergy with Marcus and the poison just enhances that. Shikome might be okay, but they seem very squishy for 8SS. The big beast with Infect is, as you said, the rogue necromancy which is already a pretty great model to take so it seems almost mandatory to put in the poison Marcus crew. I wish that all of the poison giving models in Arcanists had infect instead of just handing out poison, same with the Dawn Serpent. Too late now I guess, but it sucks that the Razorspine Rattler doesn't have all that much synergy with Marcus' new upgrade. I also desperately wish the was inbuilt in Marcus' Shillelagh with his new upgrade. Back on topic, I ran a 40SS poison list with Marcus that didn't work out too well in a Gaining Grounds league game. My opponent and I were playing mostly seriously and I switched to playing for league points on around turn 4 when I didn't see a way to win. My list was: Marcus - 4SS Cache 1SS - Trail of the Gods 1SS - Venomancy 1SS - Feral Instincts Jackalope - 2SS Myranda - 8SS 1SS - Imbued Energies The Scorpius - 6SS Performer - 5SS Poison Gamin - 5SS Poison Gamin - 5SS Poison Gamin - 5SS I charged Marcus into my opponents crew on activation 1 of turn 2 which was against the game plan for poison. He died, and my opponent was playing Titania with the new tanky upgrade which lead to my mostly minion crew being almost unable to damage her. What I felt the list was lacking was a melee model with the Infect trigger for Marcus to use his new (0) on, but I didn't play Marcus correctly for the poison style.

I'd just like to point out that the leap needs a 5, which can decide to just not show up when you need it. The Cerberus is a great model but Arcanist leaps in general are pretty unreliable. On the topic of Hanged, I don't care how bad they may be they terrify me. I really hate the idea of having my master lose half their wounds to a single attack. I know that is the worst case scenario but I cannot allow hanged to live because of it.

In Colette's vignette in Ripples, it seemed that she and Kaeris were becoming friends. Also, in Raspy's vignette Kaeris sent numerous messengers telling Rasputina to stop raiding towns so much and she responded by eating the messengers, so they're probably not too friendly.

Another factor is that the number of models that ignore damage reduction have been growing. If models had stuck to ignoring specific abilities like Armour and Incorporeal then things that flat-out reduce damage would have been stronger. I remember playing with the riders when my, and the meta I play in's, collection was much more limited and when it got to later turns with or against the Riders they really felt invincible. I think upping the wound counts of some of the riders could be the way to go, combined with other tweaks. Increasing wound counts is a pretty granular change, so it might be easier to balance.

Similarly in Arcanists, the Master that isn't really beholden to a certain key word (Sandeep) really outshines most of the others. For the upgrade idea, maybe allow you to discard it to take a Sh action or an attack action when you activate? It would be worse than Oathkeeper with the upside of bandit synergy.

Not a jump, but a range 10 push. (0) action that needs a 7 pushes A&D into base contact with target scrap marker and then discards it. It doesn't come up all that often.

It was discussed on this episode and decided that the big limiter on Raspy's summoning upgrade was its range of 6, but as it is a Ca you can bounce it through FH models for a massive range boost. It isn't a projectile (obviously) so you can easily just target a scrap marker in a big clump of models where your Golem/Gamin died to resummon it. A range 16"+ summon is pretty ridiculous.

Speaking of these four criteria for new upgrades reminds me of what bothered me most about the Prompt nerf, which is that it didn't just change it to simply follow the same restriction as every Obey in the game by making it allow one attack (per model) per turn. The best (and most thematic) part of Prompt was being able to run rings around your opponent to complete schemes, not prompting Langston three times to kill something. What I wish Colette was able to do is be able to scheme effectively without killing, and these new upgrades are the polar opposite of that.

Looking at Mei Feng's new upgrade Press The Advantage, it gives her a trigger to all Ml actions to take the Railwalker action. Her Tiger Claw action has an inbuilt so it only needs a card or stone to get the trigger but her Jackhammer Kick needs a stone and a card to get it off. This would actually make sense if they were planning on giving her an inbuilt to her Jackhammer Kick as part of a buff in January's errata. Being able to out armour as an inbuilt trigger would allow her to maintain some defensiveness on the turn she decides to drop her vent steam bubble and go all in as well. It probably won't happen but I have my hopes.

It might have been interesting if the (0) action only required LoS, instead of LoS and range 8. As it is if your opponent even gets an inkling that you are setting up a good minion to hit with this they can just activate the minion, making it so you can't target it at all. I've gotta say when you compare both of Colette's new upgrades to Collodi's base attack, it just hurts.

There is a 17 activation Marcus list I wish I could try out, but the beasts are spread across several factions. Marcus - 5SS - Trail of the Gods (1SS) - Seize the Day (1SS) The Jackalope (2SS) 4 x Corrupted Hounds (12SS) 4 x Guild Hounds (12SS) 4 x Night Terrors (12SS) 3 x Malifaux Raptors (9SS) I really want to get some payback against Hamelin, don't judge me.

After that amount of set up I'd still probably prefer a single focused 2/4/6, slow after succeeding and opponent discards a card shot than two Gunsmith ones. Gunsmiths at their best (with fast and burning set up) are probably better than December Acolytes outside of Raspy crews, but that set up costs you.

Because they aren't December Acolytes.

There is no timing step for being killed other than being removed from the table: "When a number of points of damage is taken by a model, it reduces its current Wounds by that amount. If the model is reduced to 0 or fewer Wounds it is immediately removed from the game as killed" , I don't see any rule about scheme and strategies being checked at the end of a step either. Here is the wording on a different model with a similar ability, Bad Juju: "When this model is killed (not sacrificed), it is not killed. Instead, bury this model. Remove all conditions and heal all damage on this model." By the interpretation above, after Juju is killed but before he is removed a head should be placed as per headhunter. If, instead a more reasonable interpretation of the rules (i.e. models don't count as being killed if a rule states that they are not killed) were used none of these issues would occur.

Those all apply to other models with the same wording as Huggy, meaning that this interpretation affects them as well. Also, Headhunter quite clearly says that the marker is placed when a model kills or sacrifices a non-peon model which it considers an enemy before that model leaves play. Huggy is fair game for that with the Schrödinger's interpretation of the rules.

Well Johan (who also benefits from HPM btw) gets to attack flips while near friendly M&SU models and to damage against constructs and Tyrants at a 3/4/6 damage spread and flurry. I think that, all up, is better than discarding for focused +1, especially given that Ironsides has no extra card draw and likely has no room for Arcane Reservoir, although the card draw on cheating defence could even that out for the Shastar. Additionally, Johan has a cleanse, which is half the reason you take him. Johan also has the (2)action Open Revolt to make all friendly M&SU models heal 1/2/3, which is situationally useful. Finally, he has finish the job which, with thought put into positioning, can easily score you a VP when he dies. He isn't as defensive though, or quite as fast, I'll give you that. Edit: Oh yeah, and for better or for worse Johan counts as a 6SS model for schemes where that may come up, such as Vendetta.

Headhunter's wording is whenever a model kills or sacrifices another model, not after. A Quick Murder is: This crew earns 2 VP if the noted enemy model is killed or sacrificed before the end of the game. Assassinate's wording is: "If the enemy Leader is killed or sacrificed, reveal this scheme. If the enemy leader is killed or sacrificed, reveal this Scheme." If this is how it works with regard to assassinate then why would it have needed to be changed to eliminate the leadership? The definition of killed in the rulebook is: "When a number of points of damage is taken by a model, it reduces its current Wounds by that amount. If the model is reduced to 0 or fewer Wounds it is immediately removed from the game as killed." I don't see how you can consider a model to have been killed without it being immediately removed from the game. If you allow for a model to count as being killed without being removed then it should also be possible for it to be considered to have been killed and not killed at the same time. So, why shouldn't Eat Your Fill work? Huggy has been killed during the action preceding Eat Your Fill, he just happens to be not killed at the end of it, he was still killed so why not full heal?

It is pretty hard to justify their cost when for one less SS you can hire Johan and for 2-3 less SS you can get some Oxfordians.

Would this mean that Huggy also counts as killed for schemes and strategies? If Rising Sun isn't retroactive in some sense then Huggy has been killed and then buried, meaning you would get VP for killing him. There are a few models with on kill summon effects which would apparently work on huggy, and models with on kill buffs. Do models with Eat Your Fill heal off of huggy? The timing does seem to play out in favour of the Schrödinger's huggy strategy, I'll agree, but with this interpretation a lot of other models should be counting as being killed just before they're not killed. Leveticus, Bad Juju and (I think) Bete Noir have abilities with similar wording to Rising Sun, should schemes that involve killing models be playing out differently? I think by the Schrödinger interpretation these models should at the very least be dropping heads when they are buried, while end of turn scoring becomes more ambiguous. I think this needs an FAQ or errata.

2 things: 1 - There is some mention of taking railwalker's trigger passenger line (on Mei's new upgrade) with the take advantage of every opening ability, this won't work as railwalker is not an attack action. 2 - I don't think the Schrödinger's huggy trick works that way as Lynch's Rising Sun upgrade says that Huggy is not killed and is instead buried. If it did work that way I think huggy would be removed from the table as per being killed and Rising Sun wouldn't work.

I don't have much of a problem with a boost for ironsides but I think it may become a problem with Sandeep. Combined with Arcane Shield, the + Oxfordian Mage can now furiously cast Sandeep 18"+ up the board in three separate pushes without damaging him. That is pretty ridiculous.

They make it that hard because Ramos can summon 8-12SS of models per turn off of them. Steamfitters are amazing with Ramos specifically because you can choose to activate them whenever a high is in the discard pile, such as immediately after you've cheated one in on the first turn. I brought two of them in a Ramos game and summoned 36SS of spiders in the first three turns. If you look at Mei Feng, she uses scrap in a much less powerful way than Ramos and Wyrd released models that made scrap generation incredibly easy with her (The Emissary and The Mechanized Porkchop)

My bad. I hereby formally retract that suggestion.

Although the Dark Carnival alt exists, I think an alternate-sculpt of Performers would be great for tournament prizes (if that is a consideration) as they are Mercenaries that have synergies across a few different factions. Another Totem alt-sculpt that would probably be welcome is the Brass Arachnid, for obvious reasons.

Yeah, that gives Langston a really scary threat range when combined with Imbued Energies. You don't even need to have a 6+ in hand to affect the game because your opponent will probably need to play around you having it. Path to Salvation is 6" place (and gives an extra 2" of movement for 50mm base), 10" of walking and then 8" charge threat for a maximum threat range of 24". If you use Sandeep to pull Langston up 6" you get a pretty massive range on your alpha strike.