Hey there!
I'm looking to get into Kin as my first Malifaux crew and I thought it'd be useful to see if my inexperienced first reading of the cards is more or less accurate as to the role each one is intended to play.
Francois
Feels like the first opposed duel you make is a really important decision because of Rapid Reaction. Looks like he mostly wants to be using Gremlin Menace and melee to take advantage of his high sword stat but he can shoot acceptably as well. 9 health, effectively 6/6 defenses, sometimes shielded and potentially Challenge for additional defense makes him seem pretty tanky but I've heard folks say he's not really usable after his nerf which is a bit surprising to me; is it just that he's still not tough enough to stick around long enough for his 9 health cost, or is he not putting out enough damage because you are limited to 2/3/4 most of the time without cheating/stoning?
LaCroix Raiders
They can draw you cards in a couple of ways which feels potentially useful given how many cards Ophelia can burn through on her own. They will die if anything serious looks at them though.
Ophelia
She shoots the guns that makes the peoples fall down. I don't feel like she's very difficult to understand and she does look very good at throwing out huge amounts of attacks and ping damage with some useful other options if needed (my first opponent is likely to be Kaeris so Rebel Yell to clear off huge amounts of burning seems like it might be clutch).
Pere Ravage
He runs towards the enemy and explodes? Am I right in thinking that if he gets the No, Down Pig trigger the target takes +3 damage from that and then +3 damage from the explosive demise trigger? That's a lot of damage if so! 7 stones seems quite expensive for a bomb but I can see it being interesting to put him somewhere as a deterrent for your opponent's big expensive pieces they don't want to trade. Probably not into Kaeris though.
Rami
He has a big gun. Long range, potentially longer if needed, will suffer if he is shooting into concealment but otherwise he looks like someone you just leave in the backline and plink away with. Two Gremlins in a Ghile Suit seems like it might be a useful upgrade to make it more difficult for the enemy to charge his position?
Raphael
Good gun, good melee, some control and some condition removal for himself. He seems like a solid all round piece that hates willpower duels but can otherwise handle most comers. Doesn't like enemies that put out lots of attacks because Hard to Kill and Shielded is his main defense tech?
Sammy
Petty Illusions with the number of Wild Shot triggers in the keyword is a good source of card draw you otherwise lack. 7 WP is big into some matchups. Putrefy seems more cute than good - you're not sad if the opportunity comes up but specifically needing an 8 (or higher) of crows probably limits it a bit? I guess you can stone for the trigger if you really need the scheme marker removed? Jynx seems like the main thing she's going to be doing and voodoo pins is mostly there as a consolation prize if she gets engaged.
Merris
She's real fast and she can drop a scheme marker at range if you have a tome. Shockwaves might be good at the end of the round if your opponent's hand is drained and you've somehow held on to a lot to discard. Up We Go with effective stat 3 is also very nice but she will die extremely fast if people get the opportunity to hit her a lot and/or don't care about her concealment so she mostly wants to jump in at the end of a round, do her thing and get back out again.
Is that more or less accurate? Am I missing any nice obvious synergies? I haven't got the title box yet so I'm not too worried about that (Ophelia2 looks fun but also you need to know which upgrades to give to who and when so I'm not going to worry about her until I've got a good few reps in with the base crew).
