MrPieChee

Something that can be printed in black and white (without wasting ink/toner on images). I'd also love to see the app have the option to print cards in black and white - would be great to have outlined art, but that's probably a lot of work. I've got loads of M2E models with no cards

Wyrd simply need to decide a models purpose. If Vincent is just meant to be good at killing summons, then his stats and cost need to be such that he is taken in 100% of games against a summoner in keyword. However, if the goal was that Vincent should be the bread and butter of most Reva crews with a little summon killing on the side, then stats and cost should be such that he appears in 80% of Reva crews no matter the opponent's master. With cheap models, they need a role defined. Are they road blocks? Are they a tech pick for a given strategy or type of scheme? Are they a damage threat that has to be dealt with (i.e. a distraction). Are they a support piece for the keyword? Most cheap minions that no one seems to take have no clear role defined. Each model needs a role, and tooled for that role. It's probably also worth saying that every one within a keyword needs a slightly different roll so that they are all viable. Some keywords might have similar rolls, like tank beater and "scheme runner" beater. Once the role is defined then you can gauge how good they are by how often they are taken in given game. Going back to Vincent, if you've decided his role isn't to support the keyword, but is actually purely for killing summons, and is only being seen in 50% of games Vs summoners then he needs a little tweak. As a little side note, hybrid roles and jack's of all trades can be good, but they appear to not work at all with cheap models.

Ha! It's only a short two line ability and I still missed that!

The other aspect to keep in mind is that in a tournament setting with limited time, having elite models might make you more likely to finish a game. Cheap models probably shouldn't require cards to get their value out - I think there is probably a balance between cheap models that have a defined purpose are are worth spending resources on, and cheap models that are just another body to get a job done (so they can't have a need for cards). I also wouldn't consider 6-7 models in the cheap category, they probably need different fixes than 2-5 models. It might be interesting to add a 'cannon fodder' phase to the game, where all cheap models have to act at a given time - what's defined as cheap could be dictated by a rule rather than cost, but mostly be reserved for models 2-5 ss, but not all models in that bracket would get it. My first thought would be, at the start of a new turn, all models with the said rule have to act before any models without that rule. Something might need to be tweaked with pass tokens. I'm not a fan of the double activation back to back as the turn passes over if you win initiative, so this would help that if you had cheap models that could do anything about it. Not sure this is the sort of thing that would happen mid edition though. So, I think the best we can hope for is that all cheap models not currently being used get made simpler (so they cost less time to play in a tournament settling) and/or have any card cost associated with them removed (which could mean a flatter damage track, 1/X/X), and/or have a single specific role well designed which is needed by their keyword in at least one strategy and two or more schemes. I also think there are two problems - many (half?) cheap models are plain bad, and most minions aren't worth taking more than one of. In the gaining grounds 2 thread I suggested an optional game variant where additional minions after the first of a specific type cost one less (so 4 corrupted hounds cost 9ss instead of 12ss). Some tweaks to specific models might be needed to account for this though. This would target casual and beginner play more than the top tables - not sure they are as bothered about only using one model from a box of three that costs £20+ than I am!

Oh, I wasn't trying to say use it to balance all the current issues. Someone suggested it as something they'd like to see in the new GG and someone else said there is no way it could ever work because it could only help already powerful masters. I was simply trying to say it would actually make it easier to balance those masters (but other errata would still be needed).

If you read the rest of the post, I explain how. You don't try and balance for all, you pick your target keywords/masters and you balance for them (by making it easy for them, hard for others). If you've got a few known schemes, you have less to worry about when trying to balance everything else. Balancing with completely random schemes and strategies is hard. But: - if you know every strategy has a scheme that's easy to score with the type of crew that is bad at that strategy - and you know that every bottom tier master from each faction has a scheme that's easy to score for their normal play style. Then it becomes much easier to balance the game as a whole. I know that for the most part every master isn't balanced for every strategy, but sometimes a player wants to learn a master and stand a chance in any match up, or they want to solo master a tournament.

Is it worth hitting the scribe turn 1 and then activating second for the focus? The heal is wasted, but seems like an easy focus pulse... Does anyone use investigators?

You can balance the schemes. Faction specific schemes can be balanced based on the strength of the faction in the current set of strategies and random schemes. The static scheme could be balanced against a strategy it's paired with such that masters that are bad at that strategy could be good at the static scheme. If you ask me, it would make it easier to balance the game. At the moment you have the issue that the game could get balanced for a given gaining grounds, but then the next one throws that out the window. Having these extra 'known' schemes means you have more fixed points to balance against.

How has big hat done in the vassal leagues? I haven't seen many complaints that they are op. Seen talk of banjo's and cranky needing a buff though.

Is there an issue with the main rule book stock? I've got a few boxes being held up because of the rule book. Just wanted to make sure its worth waiting for it. I ordered a new release box and a few older ones which weren't in stock at the time, but have all arrived at the store now. I was happy with the free version, but after reading some of the faction books and some old edition books I got second hand, I'm interested in the fluff in the main book too.

I see now, ok, thanks. Thematically not a fan, but I understand the wording now.

The trigger targets multiple models - is it not ok that at least one of them is still in play?

I would have thought yes - other models within 2 still need to take a MV dual... (I'm very inexperienced at Malifaux, so @beloreyis much more likely to be right)

I didn't mean that part of the discussion - the last page has basically been cheap models Vs elite beaters and that it's a worth while trade. The data says otherwise.

There's more than one turn in a game of Malifaux. If we assume that first turn no killing happens (which in many cases isn't true), then if your 10ss model kills two 5ss models in two turns, you have two turns left for scoring. I think all of this last page of discussion is a bit pointless - there are some good cheap models, but most cheap models never see the light of day in a tournament list. That means something's bad about them. Untill players start winning games in a competitive environment with the 'bad' cheap models then trying to tell people they are good is a waste of time.

If a 7ss model kills a 5ss model most turns then I wouldn't say the player with lots of 5ss models is likely to be winning. If they somehow trick the 7ss model to get so out of position they do nothing for the rest of the game, then that's worthwhile, but I don't think a good player would ever let that happen. The slight corner case is if that 5ss model had the ability to score several VP, but I doubt that would end up removing the 7ss model from the game, and even if it did, denying the VPs would be worth the cost difference (in most situations 5ss Vs 5ss is a risk, so making sure those VP are denied requires some extra cost).

It would be great to see focus either affect the dual or the damage, but not both (potentially having the ability to use two, one for the opposed dual and one for damage). I know lots of people hate the idea, but it would help balance high and low cost models.

Generally a good idea for 35ss games is to reduce the hand size to 5 cards, as far as I can tell. I'm not sure there are that many summoning henchmen? Asura, but I don't think she would be op. Toshiro, but again, not sure he would be op. I like the idea of adding extra ss for cheaper leaders, but as I understand it, among beginners you likely won't notice the difference.

Love endless wave, surprise encounter and shadowy figures! This feels very much like an evolution of the game variants already in gaining grounds. It would be great to see more of these 'wildcard' options in the next GG...

I wouldn't increase the cost with more minions - the first is full price and all others are one less. The advantage of having such a good app supporting the game is that this could be done very simply. It does need some support for custom formats though, and a way to group crews by format. I'm also a big fan of fixing problems with erratas where possible. Again, with the app, it's very easy to push updates to players. However, even with a good set of erratas, I think that due to the nature of the game, there will still be a tendancy to take singles of minions. I don't think that this tweak would be used in high level games, but could be popular in new player friendly tournaments and, if officially supported, in casual games.

Here's a curve ball from a new player: Minions are sold in boxes of 2-4, but it's very rare I see more than one of any specific minion in lists. So, why not make additional minions of a type already picked cost one less ss? This has some big outliers where the minions are already great (or really cheap). Also 1ss is quite a lot, but the lack of granularity in model costs makes it difficult to do anything else. I think that perhaps the emphasis on activation control might help balance this? It could be restricted to a single minion type? In tournaments with new players this will help, since they will have duplicate models that more experienced players with bigger collections won't be using. A more complex system could be to give card draw (with a discard?) when activating the second and successive minions of a given type. Obviously with the restriction of it being only models bought at crew selection (i.e. not summoned models). This would give players a boost early on, but as minions die, remove this bonus.

The head of the gremlin with the pigapult! Three pieces for such a small head! Ridiculous. (Made worse by the tiny sprue vs big box and high price tag)

Since Malifaux is a character driven game, I'd like to see none of the strategy's kill based, or at the very least minion only killing. It makes little sense that enforcers/henchmen/masters get killed all the time in little scraps and yet have a bigger story arc which needs them to survive. It detaches the game from the fluff - which is fine if you haven't made most of the units specific characters in said fluff.

Is three stones worth one pass token? Are 12ss worth 4? I feel like they should be insignificant, but they need something else if they are. Perhaps a one stone drop, but as I said in the hounds thread, it would be great if they could drag scheme markers around, and pack mentality got a boost (via a bonus action or similar).

Do you think that the ook tax is needed if there is a hard limit on the number of ook ss you can take? Is that worth testing in a vassal league?