Blackraw

Thanks for discussion guys!

Glad to hear that opinions are different.

I will leave mine too as it differs from others.

Poison gamins

I LOVE poison gamins for summon.

They had good statline 5/5/5/5 Df/Wp/Wd/Wk armor +1 and they have poison demise! Stealing it Banasuva does 1+1+1+1 on explosion, with the later 1+1 being from conditions, thus denying FFM and getting over H2K. Four separate sources makes prevention much less efficient and deny armor.

He has 2"  which is good to tie things up. And when it gets to 3"  with upgrade that is even better.

However in many cases I would want specific other gamin, but I still enjoy poison ones. Not sure if good hiring option. Maybe for Marcus?

SS Miner

As was said above, after @MythicFOX comments on SS Miner, I bought them next day and was also happy with the model in game.

The Captain

He is awesome, but expensive. It is alright with Hank, but with the Captain I doubt he would be able to live long enough to justify his price. 

As for game design, I think he should have been a little cheaper and at the same time a little less awesome. That would probably make him see more often play. Or maybe his upgrade could give him armor +1 or enhance SS prevent by +1 for him only. Dunno. I just think that in the current condition, I cannot find a spot for him. He can do lots of things. But he can not do them at the same time, so the benefit is still limited by the number of activations you have with him

But I promise to give him a try so that I check it all by myself

Gunsmiths

I was never frustrated with them when playing with Kaeris (their  refers to all duels, not attack actions only). But will I ever consider them instead of Acolytes for range attack for other crews? - No. I belive they have their niche with Kaeris and they could have their niche somewhere else if not for Acolyte being same price more benefit.

Bears

Well, now I thought that I should give them a try. There is probably a reason they exist for, so maybe I will find it

My never-seen-before list

I never ever heard anything about Willie, he looks ok. But the only reason to take him I see is "Why not?". He is not that well at cuicide shenenigans as Papa Loco or Pere.

Actually same as for Bears, but I gonna try them out.

Also haven't seen Moleman and Electric creation (outside of Ramos - scrap marker usage).

1 minute ago, spooky_squirrel said:

Heheh, thank you for the feedback. I had forgotten them, so I edited my initial post to include I2W and make a special note that prevention and arcane shield still work, but are more rare than other defensive tech (very specific models for the shield, specific models for soulstones). Of course, now that I'm over-thinking it, if your opponent plays nothing but Henchmen under a Master, everyone has soulstone use, and if Sandeep only hires Oxfordian Mages and Sanctioned Spellcasters, everyone has Arcane Shield (though it won't come up always because someone has to activate).

Sure, all of that is definately rare things comparing to H2W, H2K, Armor. And as for I2W - frankly speaking Joss does not care about it that much, unless he wants to RJ someone, since the damage line is narrow (3 vs. 4) I would say that I2W is unlikely to stop him from attacking a target he wants

F**K Thanks for claryfing, I was expecting some trap there)

Hello guys. We seem to discuss the good models so much, so I suggest we speak about of outsiders of our factions.

I suggest to share your thoughts on the following:

1) What are the models you almost never see get any play for valid reasons? 

2) What are the worst models due to bad game desing?

3) What are the worst models due to being overpriced?

18 minutes ago, Frollo the Wordbearer said:

Anyway, positively impressed. Cool models (far better than it seemed in photos), cool rules, very funny to play.

Byez

Good to hear that you have enjoyed it! 

Joss-regen thing made me think of the following:

(I do not have rulebook by me to clarify).

Joss reactivates near nephilims, get to 2Wd due regeneration. Joss beats nephilim (either one (2) AP attack or 2 (1) AP attacks with SS on prevent so that he does not die. Gets back to 1 Wd. Then repeat.

Will that work? (Not as a tactica, but from standpoint of mechanics)

Also minor question to more experienced Sandeep/Arcanists players. Is Recharge SS a good one to pick with Sandeep (hard to deny he's so SS hungry)? 

20 hours ago, spooky_squirrel said:

It seems like what worked for you most there was your opponent made mistakes. They had their models clustered too closely (McMourning crews, in my experience, tend to poison themselves to get additional mobility and to set up nasty traps, so they shouldn't be playing in such a way where their own catalyst hurts them), and they put a lot of their own AP into killing your summons instead of either the summoner or the support. While they wore themselves down with mistakes and you saw massive return on minor investment of cards and AP, it's not quite the same thing. I pose the question: if they paralyzed or buried your summons, what would have gone different?

No doubts it was. Do not get me wrong - I do not present is as a tactic, neither I do incite to do so. But when I saw my opponent choosing to stay in a bubble, that was just an occasion for attrition. Since he has to deal with 3"  of extended range Poison gamin and 2"  of Banasuva right at his face. He did paralyze Banasuva getting him off game for the first turn, but he had to kill him, so that I do not activate it early next turn. So he had to deal with renewable summons which passively damaged him whilst exploding, thus he spent both Wd and AP.

1 hour ago, spooky_squirrel said:

The Captain and Joss have two completely different roles

 

As always - great breakdown! I did not notice your post which appeared whilst I was finishing mine

I will share some experience with Joss and some thoughts about Captain since I am still trying to find a crew where I want him.

Joss - he is tanky. Armor +2, H2K with reactivate on 1wd. With Kaeris heal/regeneration from warding runes he may be really survivable (and get regenerate each time he reach 1Wd). Attackwise he is can opener. Yes 3 min damage is good. But since he can do only two attacks (min 6 dmg), does not have offensive triggers or , it is not that great for 10SS model, especially given that the max damage is 4. So he does 3/4/4. E.g. fire gamin does 3/3/4 (effecitively - if calculate burning) but for 4ss. Other min 3 dmg models has better moderate/sever. What is good about him that he ignores most of the defensive abilities (armor, h2w, h2k, def triggers), having to deal only with incorporeal, I2W, prevent and arcane shield. Thus he can get some hard guys wrecked. So if you attack models that does not have any of those, that he ignores, he is not that dmg guy. Also he lacks some mobility to deliver his attacks. Not great charge, not 3"  reach. However he can hold some points pretty well. Mostly when I take him I also get warding runes to counter various negative stuff (like lures) and some two-suits triggers which make him even more survivable and better ground-holder. For henchman hardcore I played with 2 Ox mages, warding runes and Johan. With all M&SU the synergy was great (Warding runes from mages to Joss,  flips to Johan from anyone, Joss-pushes from mages,  WP to mages, heal from Johan).

Does Kaeris need him? Almost any master may find him useful at certain occaisons. Kaeris may also do not mind Ox mage/mages for extra burning-DD, thus giving him access to runes. His survivability may be enhanced by her heal. As for trigger ignores, with burning damage helping to deal with it, his can/opener feature may not be that crucial for her. 

Captain - pretty awesome utility with pushes. Relic hammer is so nice thing with his 3" ,  on Constructs and nice damage spread. With Captain you top it up with +2 burning which is also incredible. However, as for his survivability, I guess he need to spend the stones to prevent to live, making him even more costy. He costs 10ss, with Warding runes and Patron's blessing he is 13SS, add some SS prevent (luckily Kaeris does not need SS for suits that much, so can allow herself to spend some on her own and her hencman's survivability. He can be really helpful to get your model into position and/or get opponent out of scoring zone (or away from your marker). He can launch forward and burn up a Rail Golem in a single AP which is nice, but making the whole thing hell costy. I do not think he is top choice for Henchman Hardcore as he dies faster than Joss. 

For Kaeris he can be an extra source of burning opponent/friendly models (With Kaeris that push also grants +2 burning = +2 heal. Which is good.). Not to say that pushes are also great. So yes, he will be useful. But I do not know if he is 10-13SS useful. For 13SS you can get Angelica for two pushes a turn and potential PP-caddie (6SS/7SS with PP) and Johan (7SS) for Relic Hammer (and other utility also) or Firestarter (7SS) for burning.

1 hour ago, Fictor said:

I have Ramos's card and know the TN, but I'm a cool freak of Malifaux and want the card to print, and save on a sleeve xD

Well, I guess getting printscreen from App and cutting it in photo editor may be an option?

One spider = 5 +

Two spiders = 8 +

Three spiders = 11 +

You have a  built in.

14 minutes ago, spooky_squirrel said:

Sandeep can play similarly (but not as effectively) because his summons are high enough value where they need to be dealt with, and every AP being spent on killing summoned things is AP not being spent on schemes or on killing your hired crew.
 

I had a game against bubbled'up McMorning. With standard deployment I ran for first turn summon, popping up poison gamin + Banasuva (which copied poison demise) at the bubble. Of course my summons died (leaving 3*1 damage +1 burning +2 poison (which was affected by opponents own catalyst). On the second turn I re-summon that combo again and retreated. By the time my opponent dealt with both summon packs, he got solid damage of demises. At the same time I used my time to position Ox Trio set in a perfect gunline on different flanks of Extraction marker, ready to finish wounded opponents who go for marker. So that was basically a successful attrition, where I traded few SS + cards and master's AP for opponent spending most of his AP to eventually get his own hired models wounded. Sounds like a bargain

19 minutes ago, saxcloud said:

So, basically , how can i collect them? 

Ramos box+spider box+ electric creation

or Sandeep box, two box of gamin, oxfordian mages 

 

are both a good start?

Whilst Ramos list you quoted is solid pick to arm a 35ss crew,

I would say Sandeep with that set of models will feel quite limited in playstyle.

You suggested $66 spent over Sandeep box.

I would suggest you add $11 more and get:

Troubleshooters $45
Wind gamin $21
Johan $11

The rationale is:

Tony box > Mages, since you get extra master for the future and great (though pricey) henchman.

I would not buy 2 boxes of gamin on start. There are more urgent things you may need. Wind is good for scheme run and nasty pushes.

Johan is just must-have model as I believe. Too good for his 7SS, especially for Arcanists.

Captain can top up your crew on start (pushes for mages, M&SU henchman for  WP duels to mages, M&SU fighter nearby for  Attack to Johan, better target for warding runes than Kudra). 

You get many mobility with this (pushes from mages/gamins/captain + synergy (mages-captain-johan and academic synergies) + 2 relic hummers +3 furious casting.

Of course you do not get awesome respond to any opponent/schemes, but without buying half of arcanist models, this looks a) fun and b ) educative.

Later on you would want much more models from different themes (M&SU, Frozen Heart, Showgirls and even Beasts). But at least wind/captain/oxmages/johan may find their ways to other crews, whilst I doubt that Kudra/poison will.

@mythicFOX

I am in a very similar situation. Run 3 tourney with Sandeep (placed 2/1/1) and can not find a reason not to take him (so my question about other masters was mere curiosity).

He is still new to many players, he is flexible in playstyle, he's hiring pull lets you pick what you want.

I am getting Rasputina now (still painting) to have an alternative where I really want it (rather than need). Will try her out on some friendly-play though

The masters you describe as being more well-suited to some scheme/strat pools I think also have a minor disadvantage here - a) they may be expectable for that pools and b ) they may be more predictable as all goes around their feature, which to may mind lead to the idea that you can go against a good counter.

@spooky_squirrelWith Ramos summon engine, hard to deny its sheer numbers efficiency, but with my meta/experience I see the following thing:

a) With my experience, tourney games tend to end at Turn 3 in average due to time limits. Which means that with hand and scrap markers max out at 9 2-wound spiders (which you may heal with Johan though). However that is already resource intense - you need stone + scrap + card. You are limited by scrap markers. Sandeep needs more AP, but can deliver more game-changing models (full health, upgrades, where you need them). To my mind this allows for better "Alpha" VP-wise, allowing activation control early on and more VP on turns 2-3. Also in Howard+Joss list Ramos would most likely start with less activations than Sandeep.

Again, not trying to deny Ramos summon efficiency. Just feel like with short games (turn-wise) Sandeep summon is more efficient to score VPs.

Hands down Colette box is more independent than Raspy's one.

Some of the models will intertwine indeed. With "box only" restriction I would favour Colette.

As for the playstyle - that is pretty much up to individual preferences.

2 hours ago, spooky_squirrel said:

Short answer: More? Yes. Much more? Eh.. we'll see when the counters hit

 

Long answer: Sandeep is an all-rounder type, but he still doesn't do attrition on the same scale as Ramos. When you want the board flooded and choked with your stuff, Ramos is your guy. There are Schemes and Strategies where the opponent match-up makes it a perfect storm for Ramos. He doesn't scheme in the same way as Colette, so when the scenario is a perfect storm for Colette, she'll have a much more reliable effect on the board. I wouldn't say "much more" but I would say that they have an advantage into the right pools.

For instance: Ramos has a distinct advantage into Interference and Extraction. He can get more bodies there over the course of the game as his summons are not hard-capped on total in play. Over 5 turns you can put 15 spiders on the table and if none of them have died, you've got 15 spiders on the table. It takes Hamelin and Somer to keep up. When it comes to schemes, anything that relies on putting conditions on your models is doomed to failure. Ramos can controlled detonate things to clear conditions. The spiders themselves, if accused the turn they're summoned, can activate (when near two others) and turn into a swarm, losing the condition due to the model being sacrificed. Anything involving putting conditions on opponents or simply putting markers into play becomes trivial when you can crank out a ton of spiders. His strengths are dependent on your hand (and getting the first couple of scrap markers into play.

Colette's advantages come into play with anything that involves a lot of interacts. Showgirls and Minions can treat a (1) interact as a (0) so long as they're within her aura, allowing them to do a whole lot more during the turn. She can on an upgrade (2) to give everyone the ability to discard a marker to take a (1) action out of activation, and when you have a model that's been dialed up to do more work, she can prompt it for extra work. If needed, that model can be reactivated for its Final Act in order to get more work done. Her strengths are dependent on your crew.

Sandeep needs both hand and crew for early game advantage, in my experience.

I see the rationale. The Ramos examples make sense. I found Sandeep summoning suicide gamins (poping it at enemy bubble) to be exposed to "mark for death". With the accusation, it is a little bit easier (since you can interact in engage/teleport with Sandeep cast) or kill the gamin too.

I would say that all-roundness has its pros and cons. Whilst to some degree it is a trap, it also allows to practice one master better. As for me I am gonna stay with Sandeep on tourney until I face some obstacle leading me to idea that I need another guy for this. But I was curious to know what other Sandeep players use different masters for.

Gonna get more experiments for fun games though. Also hope that Wyrd will make some interesting new Emissary upgrade for Sandeep with next Arsenal deck. 

Well that depends on your goals and restrictions (if you want to play more in-theme or does not care, if you want to get the maximum of your current models or does not care again, etc etc).

Some masters are more plug'n'play, like Ramos, who does not need that much to make him work, and can stay pretty in theme.

Some may use out-of-faction models (Marcus, Sandeep).

With Raspy and Colette I suppose you have Cassie, Performer, Angelica, Acolytes, Silient One, the models which may find its way into many different crews due to high utility. 

As for utility in other boxes for your faction in general, I guess that it is more or less the following:

Ramos - Howard and Joss are good and may be used in many crews. Arachnids is another summon option for Rider.

Marcus - not sure if anything but Myranda-Cerberus find its way into other crews. (heard of myranda-cojo occaisonally but never seen)

Kaeris - firestarter can be cool when you need it, but I do not think he is thaat useful piece for your hiring pool in general.

Tony - Captain is fun to play and great guy, though due to his price, does not fit into every crew. Mages trio may be used in Kaeris/Sandeep crews.

Mei Feng - Rail workers are good to have as another hiring option, but I never found myself in deseprate need to buy it. Her henchman is 10T so no use.

Sandeep - not sure if anything of his box ever find its place in other crews.

Since Raspy is about range killing, Colette is about scheming, I would probably recommend you to get some brawler crew. Howard and Joss are about that, but Ramos is a little bit too straightforward to my belief. However, as I see a vote here, I will vote for Marcus

1 hour ago, mythicFOX said:

When to Myranda into a Cerberus will vary game to game depending on how when you want the card draw vs when you want the charging Cerberus.  It's very rare I go after turn two.

With; Myranda's 12" of walk + 50mm base + 7" leap + 1" melee, delivering even a slow Cerberus to the face of an opponent isn't difficult, depending on your hand (and you'll have just drawn four cards).  With even a single AP and a good tome in hand it's perfectly possible to take out objective runners and mid size targets the turn you shape shift.

I would say that on average 2/3 of the time I'm shifting turn two these days as that's when I want the cards.

Makes sense, with 4 cards on first turn I can see the only benefit is fishing for 5-10  for summon/teleport and high cards for Banasuva and cheatinng so that you get them for the second turn. Which is also good (like you have drawn 4, discarded 4, but for free). But not that game-changing as 10-11 cards hand can be.

Another question which I think may be interesting as the subject for discussion is:

Sandeep is definitely really versile and all-rounded guy with flexbile hiring pool and both schemes/kill tricks. But is there any combination of schemes/strats which makes picking one of other Arcanists' masters much more advantegous comparing to going with Sandeep?

Hey guys, I hope we will continue sharing opinions. 

I see that most preferred henchmen looks to be Cassie/Myranda.

I gave Cassie a try on last tournament and I really liked her. From the first glance she looks "naked" defense-wised, but Souther Hospitality is so good. I wish it were "untill next activation" though. However, paired weapon or other built-in  may ruin her day.

I have not had a chance to try Understudy with her, but I really liked the combination of push-trigger and nimble and another mobile source of decent attack.

Also made a little challenge to myself to play all with Commands (even though there was a Headhunter in the pool) and use some tricks discussed here. I liked it. Ice Gamin with  pop'd on the first turn allowed me to maitain a pretty decent "bubble" when needed, which also gave me a chance to use Sandeep for his attack potential in one game, with  and no  it was good enough to worse his (1) APs. Not to say that 3/5/7 Acolyte on  met all my expectations. However on later turns where there is already more direct engagement, I like to get metal gaming with  so that Johan receives  as the Metal is M&SU and Banasuva can get 6 Df and +2 armor.

Now I guess I may give Myranda a go since it gets so much good feedback from you. How do you usually play it into Cerberus?
Since I find that Sandeep crew may want many mid-to-low cards (discards for focus on SVG, furious casting, Sandeep Beacon, Hospitality and other stuff; mid tomes/masks for (0), Leap and other stuff) I think that getting +4 cards on turn one to pick the good onee for turn 2/do extra summon on turn 1 is not that good as getting 4 extra cards on turn 2. But if you shapeshift on turn 2, you get slow'd Cerberus, i.e. no charge

Thanks for sharing opinions guys.

Completely agree that December Acolyte is excellent shooting unit, so I see no sense in snipers either. 

While I do not feel like I would always want to steal frozen heart with banasuva (getting extra demise or armor +2 are solid options making the choice not easy). Ice gamin with flips + acolyte looks nuts. 

As for the mercs - had an experience of running Johan only.

But I find that I may want Taelor/Hannah at some place.

With Hannah bringing enough benefit (+card, good to hold position with her 50mm and 3" engage, suits ban and decent defense, New Entry for extra heal/Push) I may justify her price (especially where I manage to deliver some nasty blasts)

Taleor price seems dependent on whether you are able to benefit from her "welcome" trick. If not, I find Johan relict hammer to be much more of a bargain and with hungry for cards crew I would opt for MI6 with  rather than MI7 w/o.

I like strongarm model, but can't think of reason to make him justified pick over other models at 11SS.

As for henchmen, waiting to get Carlos to give him a try. For a while thinking of Cassie for PP. I like Angelica's pushes for getting advantage on start, but further one, a dead wind gamin serve the same purpose but within the same activation.

Also haven't tried Kudra yet, not sure if I find a role for her.

Has anyone tried Aminu with Sandeep?

That is really cool that some discussion continues here. Sandeep, being kinda popular master and leaving many questions (and options) for crew-building.

Maybe we will deserved "sticked" thread one day  

For anyone eager to continue the discussion interesting to know your thoughts on the following:

1) Your favorite mercs for Sandeep?

2) Your favorite beaters for Sandeep (both)?

3) What henchmen do you use more often? Which one you never use with Sandeep?

And some more narrow topics:

1) Angelica vs. Cassandra for leave your mark games. With Cassie having nimble/understudy/decent attack and SS use in extra case, 2ss seems like a good price to pay. Though I like Angelica's pushes too. 

2) Heal options, do you prefer to have silent one/librarian to have some healing options apart Sandeep push trigger. I find it useful with H2K on some models but not sure if I would commit resources for some model only for this reason.

3) Have you ever find yourself in need to take trapper/Hans with Sandeep?

Not trying to make a questionnaire But I think that sharing some preferences with Sandeep crew-building can help people discover new options and most likely will prove how flexible Sandeep hiring can be.

I have tried it with Kaeris only and you should not be afraid of "loose burning, get flight" upgrade, since it is easy to keep him out of her aura.

Normally I flame him up with Malifaux Child. If I happen to have 1-3 tombs (which I do not need for Loco) or to flip one with Child's  I will either put 3 burning on him or burn some gunsmith to get flight and fast if I also have low ram. (apart from RG, Child still does his job well since he allows to give out flight, without activating Kaeris first (if you activate her, give flare for flight, you still has to remain with her aura to make flight work which hinders her actions on the table).

You need to understand that for locomotion you need the following number of burning:

1 shall be left after loco consumption so that you get +2 damage, 1 is spent for locomotion, X is needed to compensate for attacks which does not connect or where you prefer the Masks knock-back trigger. The connected attack will compensate you the burning back on built-in rams.

So I find that 1 initial burning and 2-3 from Malifaux child is more then enough to get him working. The problem arises if you spent loco for walk (where you consume burning) but I would rather use AP for walk safe for situation where your only sure way to engage opponent is loco Wk - loco Wk - Charge.

As for Upgrades, there aren't many models who won't like having IE. But IP is not bad either. With armor +2 - 2Wd would mean two extra attacks sustension in most of the times. 1def is not huge, but 5 is not that ugly as 4. Though mostly I ran it without upgrades since it is already costy and sometimes I used SS for cards draw to get more nasty tomes to let him rock.

The truth is as it is said above, with 5 min damage,  and potential of delivering 5+ attacks in a turn he may win you a game with one activation. Otherwise he is still good, since even without tombs he can do two 3+ dmg attacks and one 5+ damage attack, but not 11SS good. 

I still like him for the feeling it gives when you manage to gather hand full of tombs by 2nd turn

Also note, he is good FFM target. Opponent has to kill him in most of the cases. He is immune to burning, which could cheat through FFM.

P.S. I would say he 100% worth owning, but he 100% does not worth auto-including, especially in local competitive meta, given that it will be easy countered by armor mitigation.

11 hours ago, spooky_squirrel said:

Ice Dancers can hit harder, but I wouldn't distract them from earning scheme points or hunting scheme runners. 

Exactly, that is why I mentioned that I do not encourage to use them for charge.

But the reason I met the comparison is that both models can (0) Sandeep to Teleport and then charge with a decent range to deliver exactly same damage 6MI and 2/3/6. So if one takes Valedictorian for its damage output only, I bet he is overpaying. If he is sure he gets a benefit (contribution to victory) from its enhanced survivability, it may worth it under some circumstances. 

I like what @JoeCL said about Visions having part of its effect from "surprise" effect. Surely when opponent does not bear in mind Visions' effects when planning his scheming/denial or picking schemes. When players will get used to it and get ready to counter it, its effect may diminish. (Though still nuts in Headhunter  ). With commands getting close to no surprise, but getting more material and reliable benefit (i.e.  is , and interact ban is nothing when noone was going to interact).

As for "must-have's" what I am happy to have in every list is effigy. Its accomplice thing is quite nasty when you activate effigy, trigger students of all, get the summon and activate newly summoned model.

Evident choice is getting Banasuva, where it can still demise/armor+2/else from gamin so there is no room to kill him w/o armor or to Paralyze him.

However, with visions there are some tricky situations possible also. Like your opponent just killed your model, dropping a head out of close to his model and you just get it instead of him. Or you are trying to do some interact thing, and seeing that you summon the gamin for this purpose, opponent will lure/push/kill it to hinder your plans. And now I do not give him that chance.

Plus for 4SS effigy statline is just a bargain as extra scheme-runner with condition removal.

5 hours ago, spooky_squirrel said:

I've run into this problem with Immune to Slow Banasuva before. 

...

I see a lot of rationale about the Visions with Commands comparison and I do not challenge anyone's love for Commands since it is really great in what it does. However, from my observations most of Sandeep people has general preference with one of the upgrades and build the crews bearing that in mind

I like Visions for being good for reactive play. Yet again, I completely agree that there are situations when none of Visions perks grants you any benefit, whilst Commands will give you extra attack and extra flips buff and with the statement that Banasuva gets almost nothing of Visions (except for anything deriving from bigger base, but I doubt that you would want it to be left without attacks for Earth).

Speaking about whether to summon or not to summon. From my experience, even when you do not need any interactions and all you can get with visions is 2 Banasuva attacks and 1 other gamin attack, I still summon for few reasons: 1) engaging the opponent forces him to spend AP to kill gamins; 2) killing single ice/poison gamin and Banasuva stolen gamin's demise actually forces your opponent to spend AP to kill my summon models (where each model is like 0,75 SS) to deal damage to his own hired models; 3) if for some reason opponent decides that it is better to ignore my summon gamins to the big extent, I've got models on the opponents part of the table which is good for subsequent turns and I can always (1) toss my gamin into opponent and get a chance to deal him 2 dmg + damage from demise and free my upgrade for next summon.

Thanks for wind gaming charge combo on first summon, I like this idea. 

Also getting ice with  by the acolyte as @mythicFox said above in my short list of things to try out too.

As for Students and Valedictorian. I like the whole thematic idea and the plot about it, but it is hard to admit that it is not optimal pick for competitive play due to sheer numbers on the cards.. I asked about anyone's experience as I thought that maybe there are stories of good picks of Sinew/Steel against Ressers/Arcanist, since overall it gives us terrifying, rare combination of armor and H2W (which means that if (terrifying) we receive any damage, it will most likely me minimal (H2W), which will be also reduced (armor)) and ignore of main defensive feature of opponent (H2W/Armor).

I am inclined to give it a try as I do like exploring option, so maybe I will test it out when going against ressers/arcanists. As even badly invested 7SS will not ruin my game I guess.

With Valedictorian the pricing is really an issue.. With incorporeal from Sandeep and mages bonus her survivability is immense. Let us say, that in general with an expensive model, you will make sure that it can not be killed in any case before its own activation on turn 2. So it will have first turn for positioning and second turn for potential teleport + flurry. Her survivability means that your opponent has to commit many resources to kill it or ignore it. Let us say if he kills it, it may do 3rd turn activation or may die before it. but it gets some AP and resources from opponent whilst being killed (and some stolen with terrifying activations potentially). If he ignores it, it gets 3 and 4 activations (and not always a tournament game has time/sense left for turn 5).

So ideally you get 3 flurry (turns 2-4) with 2-3-6 damage, costing you discard card each turn. You pay SS/masks card for teleport. You pay SS for  trigger if you want to deliver good damage and cheat a card. You keep the mages around and you keep them in crew (even if you would not want to hire all of them). Which means that you commit hell lot of resources on crew building stage and hell lot of resources each turn to get a mediocre benefit.

Just to think about: 6SS Ice dancer has the same 6MI, the same 2/3/6 damage spread, but it can make it 3/4/7 when charging into melee with Ice gamin's (0) pop'd up (p.s. do not encourage to use ice dancers to rush forward instead of doing claim jump though).

Yes, I would be sold to take it with 4/5/6 damage or maybe even with 3/5/6 or with melee expert instead of flurry etc. 

But in fact in her damage dealing, unless you flip severe - damage track is inferior even to 4SS fire gamin or 5SS Ox mage if you count burning contribution.

50mm base with 3"  and easy reposition due to flight/teleport is awesome too, but not for that price. Again as was said above, SS miner is at least twice cheaper but cope with holding the ground when you need it. Though it may be not bad choice for Guard the Stash since it is hard to be lured out due to counterspell and hard to be killed either. Though not irreplaceable.

With malifaux being a game with resource management, it is like picking a retro cabriolet, which looks really adorable, but indeed you need a small car with low consumption to drive to work and a family wan for countryside trips and what is more important, for cabrio price you could get both.

Sue

That is the model that I bought almost right of the start, just because one simply can't refrain from buying Johny Cash inspired unit. Unfortunately unpacking is the only thing I've done to it yet. So still struggling to find it place. As for must have, I doubt that 9SS with most of his abilities being situational, can fall into this category, yet he seems good when he's needed. Sh5 with  built in is good against empty hand of your opponent with his damage spread and potential to flip the rams. Thus with H2K as the only defense and potential self-damaging I think when opponent wants him killed he will get him killed. 

P.S. apologies for my English as its gets ugly at night time.

6 hours ago, mythicFOX said:

It's been a while since I've had Mech Rider on the table, and never with Sandeep.  It's two direct and two lateral cuddles (Metal Gamin, GG16/17) in at this point and no longer the power house it was.  I don't see it adding meaningful value to Sandeep crews at this point, 12ss for a bit more summoning is too big an ask for me.

No practice with the Transmortis toys but whenever I look at the academic hiring pool it's all very meh, at least competitively speaking. I don't see what it's bringing that we don't already have better access to.  The same is true of the SVGuard, what job are they doing we can't cover better with;  Myranda, Cassandra, or Johan?

@spooky_squirrel made a great observation about hiring above.  I always think about crew hiring like the start of a heist movie where they're putting the team together. Ramos contact's Sandeep and asks him to do a job, Sandeep won't just grab the three closest mooks and go. He plans the job and hires the best people to execute it; a miner to tunnel into the vault, a performer to distract the guild officer and steal the plans from under his nose, Johan to deal with the Guards... etc.

Thanks for info. I though of Mech rider as suiting for some particular schemes (like dropping markers in engage for setup/dig their graves, summoning more gamins for interferance or doing 10" charge whilst being incorporate via Sandeep's (0). I do understand that definately it's not unique and not best choice for it, but just trying to make my hiring pool more diverse.

As for the Commands I see your point. (0) Ice gaming ing the Acolyte looks brutal since for (1) AP of Sandeep you give an extra activation and solid buff to already good unit, (though I am still in love with Vision's denial potential, I gotta give it a try in such context). Normally with Commands I did Metal/Poison and Immune to Slow Banasuva. I made it like 4 times, but I never hit a single attack with Banasuva, because every time I've got deck cancer when I tried to do this trick and "Immune to slow" bans cheating. With this taking my 2AP per turn I normally used the last one for repositioning (pushing own models). Which made my Sandeep absolutely not-damaging master.

Can't disagree with wise statement of @spooky_squirrel . I try to analyse my crew post-factum, thinking whether the model played the role that I expected from it, and if it had to do different stuff, whether I could use someone else to make this stuff better.

Imagining your heist movie scenario, I bet all the Academics would ask Sandeep "wtf, boss, why we are learning that stuff, if noone need it"