theamazingmrg

I'm not going to be able to make it again Due to a flood this time, but its still annoying! That should leave things even for you!

In my (extremely limited) experience its not the rules that are the problem, its knowing what your crew is capable of. I've only played Sonnia in my 5 M3E games, but in the most recent one I realised that my activations were over fairly quickly because I knew what each model could do and was able to come up with a plan before the activation and execute it quickly and the only references to cards were to confirm stats. My opponent was playing his first 50ss M3E game so took much longer because he was constantly checking cards to understand options. The core rules weren't a problem because it was very straightforward to say "right, flip a card, add you stat, compare it to a number/suit, was it successful or do you want to cheat?" But my opponent working out whether he wanted the or trigger was time-consuming. It got quicker as he got burned to death though.

You can still switch Masters between games in tournaments, just not factions (usually). So, if DMH is allowed, there would be no problem starting Pandora for Game 1, switching to Collodi for game 2, and then back to Pandora for the third if that's what you wanted. You just can't have Lynch in the mix unless the TO runs a non-fixed faction event, which is entirely at their discretion.

This brings up an interesting point. Malifaux is a very thematic game, always has been, right down to the mechanics of cheating fate and using soulstones to boost your effectiveness, but a lot of people played M2E (I don't have enough M1/1.5 experience to comment on that) in unthematic ways (like your Lilith crew using a selection of models that aren't really tied together other than by faction, or every Guild crew including Francisco, or Johan popping up everywhere whether there was a sensible theme reason to or not). What the M3E changes have done is make theme much more central to crew selection, which has increased the variety of crews that actually see play, and made life easier for new players. Some old players were harder hit than others, but the overall effect is probably better for the longevity of the game. It is a shame that Graves and Tannen didn't keep their Nephilim/Woe Keywords though, even if they have sided with Lynch/Huggy in the background!

The only thing I can think of off the top of my head are Third Floor Wars and Schemes and Stones (there are more, so apologies if I've forgotten!) They both have their own blogs/podcasts and Third Floor Wars have really useful YouTube videos giving breakdowns of some of the factions. They won't necessarily help you learn the rules in the first place, but they will help you understand what models can do and how they can be countered. The best way to learn though is to start small, pick a Henchman and 2-3 models and play a game, consulting the rulebook as you go (it will likely take a few hours to begin with). You should grasp the basic mechanics fairly quick - M3E is much easier to get your head round than earlier versions! Getting to know your models will probably be the hardest part!

Its similar for Lilith too, really. Just run Nekima as your Master (she is the M3E Master anyway) and you're good to go.

While I do understand the frustration with this change it has been public knowledge for well over a year. As far as tournament support goes, Dead Man's Hand models are not legal for official tournaments, but may be at local events at the TOs discretion. However, some people have raised concerns about the power level of DMH models so they may well be excluded from more tournaments as things level off and people get to grips with M3E. I wouldn't expect them to be supported further though. The rules exist so that people with those crews can still play with their models casually, but those characters are no longer part of the ongoing story for various reasons (Ramos and Lilith are imprisoned, Ryle has been switched off, Dashel apparently killed Collodi, etc.) but they won't be expanded upon. Of course, all of the DMH characters still exist in lore in some form (except Collodi and Nicodem, but they are special cases who could easily have ways of being brought back) so there is always the possibility that a new version of those characters may make a (tournament-legal) appearance in the future, but I wouldn't bet any money on it happening in the next couple of years.

I got a message form my LGS last night saying that the pre-orders for July had come in. That's 5 days into August (3 working days) for July's releases (Wyrd release at the end of the month), which really isn't bad for the UK where things can regularly take a couple of weeks after the US release date to arrive. So, as with June's releases, I don't see there being any major issues other than those that have already been communicated by Wyrd (like the Faction books not being available). Once again it seem like Wyrd is able to ship stock out worldwide in a timely fashion but the same North American distributor is having problems. This indicates one of two things: Wyrd is intentionally screwing over the North American customer base The distributor is not telling the whole truth to save face. One of those things makes sense. I'll leave it for you to decide which one.

First there was a big paragraph about it here: Then they confirm further delays with the Faction Books here (it doesn't take much to link the two posts to the same issues and assume the second printing is going to be similarly affected):

You mean a book is sold out when they specifically told us in an update they'd had delays with books being printed? Colour me surprised 😮

If you're building to counter you aren't building to succeed at your strategy and schemes. You may be able to mitigate the worst effects of your opponents crew but you will likely lose.

The announcement Wyrd made about the second printing did say that they had underestimated the demand and had run out of stock they expected to last a few months. But yes, they did warn the distributors and teh distributors didn't listen.

Never, ever, compare any other miniature company to GW. GW are their own production and distribution (even though they do also distribute stock through traditional distribution networks). They don't have the same delays or issues because they are a huge company (by comparison) and can do everything themselves so don't need to rely on third parties. Unlike Wyrd who have third-party manufacturing and third-party distribution. Plus, Wyrd have been quite open about the problems they've been experiencing with suppliers due to current US Presidential attitudes to international trade. They announced that the Faction Books would be delayed because of those problems, and now the early Gencon release of the Euripides and Rasputina crew boxes has experiencerd problems. Its not too much of a stretch to assume that the whole of July's releases have been affected by that. Wyrd underestimated demand for M3E and distributors didn't order enough stock for the June release. Now Wyrd are waiting on a restock of those items. We are currently unsure what the problem with July's stock is, but the FLGS I go to seems to think that it has something to do with the Faction books being delayed. If global issues are the problem, then Wyrd will have to adapt their stock ordering process. The stuff will arrive. We just need to be patient.

That's why I'm not sure how it will work with the new Lucius box. That's all new models.

The problem is that each faction has a range of playstyles, so its not easy to describe them in general terms (For example, it would be easy to say Guild have a lot of ranged firepower, but that doesn't explain Lucius at all). To help narrow things down, what kind of game do you like to play? Do you like forces that get in close and do lots of melee damage? Highly mobile forces? Forces that control what the other player can do? Ranged crews? Crews that summon things into play? Give us a general idea what you like and we can recommend a Master that fits.

I wasn't wrong. Something did get Burned to Death. Or should I say everything got Burned to death. I managed to kill everything and win 5-4 (3 for Plant Explosives, and 1 each for my Schemes: Power Ritual and Hold Up Their Forces). I even managed to summon a Witchling Stalker and kill Mei Feng with my last action which would have summoned a Thrall if the game had continued. Fun times. Now to pick a new Master for my next game, whenever that will be. I stand by my recommendation for Sonnia as a great choice for a new player. Burn all the things!

I know the feeling. I've got all the Guild Masters but I'm refusing to try something else until I can win a game with Sonnia (I figure that once you can win a game you should have a reasonable idea of how the crew works)! There's a good chance Basse will be the first other Master I try, so I'm canvassing for opinions now so I know what to test first!

Actually, for Sonnia to use all her abilities you only need to include her totem (whihc is going to be included anyway when she's Leader because you'd be daft not to include a free model). It's a Witchling model that exists to spread Burining, die and be resummoned. You don't need to have ALL options to use all the abilities on a master. Now, you obviously seem to prefer a world where you can take any Master and build a crew around it with a theme of your own making, but that doesn't really make sense for a narrative game like Malifaux. Personally I would rather have a Master with all the abilities available to them, and then build my list to take advantage of the rules I want to use. I'm not sure why a situation where you have to choose Upgrade A or Upgrade B for a type of list is somehow better than a situation where you have to say "Well, I'll take X of this model because it supports my objective".

That's exactly what I'd do too. No point not playing with them, just because they might change in the future.

The difference between The Wild Ones and Dufresne/Emeline is that the latter do currently have rules. They are still alt McMourning/Sybelle respectively. The Wild Ones don't. I do think they'll be an Explorer's crew though

I haven't actually played with (or even built!) my Basse crew yet, but how are we liking the individual models of his crew? Are Frontiersmen fantastic? Is Bernadette boring? Amazed by Austringers? Captivated by Cornelius? Rekt by Reichart? Rejoice for Raptors? You get the gist! How do we like them?

He was in mine. Before filling in the form, check the Orderly cards and make sure that Hoffman isn't just stuck to the back of one! I found that several of my cards were stuck together and I only noticed when I worked my way through the pack methodically!

I get that, but I do think its possibly less of an issue with Lynch than anyone else. I'd say you probably only need Depleted and Beckoners (Illuminated cost 7 and require a lot of setup to summon, and Depleted generally aren't worth considering for the starting crew (imo) but they make great models to summon in during play. So whether or not you play with a lot of Honeypot models doesn't really matter. Just have a few Depleted set to one side in case the opportunity to summon arises. But they're probably the only ones that are needed.

To be fair, I've only actually played four (beta) games. The first was against a Dreamer crew where Sonnia got double-teamed by a Teddy and Lord Chompy Bits so didn't survive long enough to do much. The second and third were both against Sandeep and it turns out you can't set Fire Elementals on fire (well, you can, but it doesn't actually do anything useful in terms of damage)! And the last game was against Zoraida that was very slow and only lasted two rounds and I couldn't get enough Burning on models because of all the Stealth and being Obeyed away to die moving Corrupted Idols! I do have my first proper M3E game lined up for Saturday though which is likely going to be against a Guild crew or Mei Feng, so there's a chance something can get Burned to death then!

Well, he's not really a summoner, same as Sonnia isn't really a summoner. He can summon, but his main thing is Rig the Deck (control hand/top of deck manipulation) and using Brilliance to buff. Youko Hamasaki might work for you though. No monstrous theme there though. The Dreamer is also a summoner, so might get disqualified on those grounds, but yes, definitely has card manipulation nonsense.