Care and feeding of Bad Juju

[Bodiless]

I've played three games with Bad Juju now, and each time he has badly underperformed for me. His first game he actually never made it onto the table - careful positioning by my opponent in surrounding my swampfiends before placing kept me from ever bringing him out. In my other two games I never seemed to get above that weak damage of 2. At 10 points with Eternal Fiend he is a pretty pricy investment for 2 damage per swing.

 

Are other people getting good use out of him? Is there an upgrade or synergy I am missing to more reliably get into those upper reaches of his damage track? 

[Patzer]

Bad juju with Eternal is a model which have performed very well for me uncountable amount of times. I usually start him on the table and just wobble him into the thick of it. Since he can return he can soak damage and wreck face, and there is no real loss if he goes down. Starting him buried is ok, but I am not that found of not having that activation early. Even though it can provide an opponent with some though choices when going after a Silurid or Waldegeist. His (0) is fantastic too, even if it hit friendly models too.

 

Onto your concerns. What have you been trying to hit when you have only been doing minimum damage, and is it only with Juju you have a hard time getting to moderate and severe? Juju is melee 6, which is above the average defence-stat, so getting to a straight or positive flip should happen time to time. Another way to go at it is try and go for severe damage by using a Focus attack.

[Nical]

Eternal fiend is good and useful, but it has a trap. Because it means you must remove(kill, sacrifice, bury) a swampfiend model to summon Bad Juju. 

It works as Addtional SS, So If you want to use it wisely......

 

1. Take Cheap and Expendable Model like Gupps. Waldgeist & Silurid sometimes are too valuable to sacrifice in 1-2 turn.

2. You can remove your own model to summon Bad juju. If you think you really needs it..... 

3. Watch out Something like Reckoning, Tara & Voids. Opponent can get advantages from Eternal fiend by them. 

 

Fears Given Form is also good upgrade. You just move Bad juju into Opponent's models. But Watch out, It works against your other models.  

In Zoraida Crew, Bad juju's job usually is not killing big things. Because You can usually kill big things by Voodoo Doll.  

[The Zinc Lich]

I'm just wandering in from the Guild forum to say that Bad Juju is a great investment. Sometimes you just need a big pile of wounds, and there is no bigger pile in the game than Juju. Play it with Lucius sometime, enjoy having almost infinite Soulstones.

 

Juju might not be the greatest at taking out enemy heavy hitters, but he can pop out of any of your leaping, flanking scheme runners. Whatever the enemy sends after a Silurid is going to be eating mud if they ever manage to actually kill it. Because of Eternal, you are also given a lot of incentive to just throw him at something. Need to put something in the Turf War zone? Bad Juju. Need to take out one of Leveticus' Waifs even though it is in range of Levi, Lazarus, and Rusty? Bad Juju. No matter what you trade Juju for, you are trading upwards; the more times the enemy kills it, the more mileage you get out of Eternal. 

[Adran]

It seesm you are playing against a pretty experienced player, who has learnt to counter your model already.

JuJu is pretty solid. But you may well find that opponents are learning how to play against eternal fiend. Which brings back his weakness of being slow.

You can't just charge a swampfiend into the enemy and expect them to kill it blindly anymore. Ifind I rarely get to make use of Eternal when I use him. But thats not a bad thing in itself. I've been able to make my opponent change the way they play, and a buried Juju does increase the survival rate of my swampfiends a surprisingly large amount. Just make sure your swampo fiends are capable of earnign you the Vp you need.

 

He has a decent damage track other than his weak, so consider focus and then you'll probably have cheatable damage.

I like Fears given form on him as well. if I can get him near the enemy, thats lots of little damage when combined with his avalanch.

[Bodiless]

The group I am playing in includes very experienced players, so no one gives away anything easy. Everyone is savvy enough to cheat up high enough to prevent straight damage flips unless they are really down on cards, which is why I am generally not seeing moderate and severe flips for him. 

 

Something I didn't think about until after I posted this is that Wicked Dolls can give out a condition to give positive flips on out of activation attack actions. I could have had one follow Juju around last night putting that condition on him for when Zoraida Obeyed him to attack. I'm trying to think if there are any other buffs available to get him a positive flip on damage that don't involve Focus.

[Adran]

In all honesty, its rare for models to be able to cheat the damage flip. About 90% of the time you'll see weak damage, or at least negative damage flips.

I can't think of an option off hand to get an auto positive. You could get Zoraida to obey him twice, firstly to focus, and then to attack.

[Csonti]

You can dose him with the Nurse for +2 damage if he is already in a good place to start his activation. So with Flurry you get 3 Attacks with a 4/7/9 damage spread. Even weak is painful but a lucky moderate on a flip yields some devastating power.

[Dirial]

I can't think of an option off hand to get an auto positive.

 

Take Papa Loco with Zoraida: BAM, done.

[Math Mathonwy]

Wild Boars and Bayou Gators make for nice Unbury systems if you want to go that route. The first because they have From the Shadows and can be in your opponent's face as early as you want them to, and the latter because they are pretty fast, pretty deadly and very squishy.

[Bodiless]

Ah, Papa Loco and Nurses were just the sort of tricks I was looking for. I'm still much more familiar with the Neverborn models than I am anything out of faction, despite studying up. 

[Nical]

Nurse is very good model for Zoraida (by Denial / Buff / Heal), But I don't think Papa Loco is good as like her. 

Because if your opponent can control him(For example, Obey), Opponent usually make he kill himself or go to useless position.

But if your opponent don't have counter like obey, He will be good.  

[Dirial]

Well, that's always a problem with Papa. Unfortunately, Neverborn have no easy answer for it (like a Death Marshal), but he is a fun model nonetheless. He might at least try it some time, and see if he likes him.

[brdparker]

I enjoy announcing Breakthrough and starting SF's far up the board. The opponent knows they're a scoring threat from the get-go and has some pressure to take them out.

[Bodiless]

In the game last night I had Breakthrough and Entourage, and between my two Silurids and Animal Form on Zoraida I was able to get 6 points from them despite being all-but-tabled and not taking Hexed Among You. Where I ran into a problem was that all of my dudes got killed, and JuJu underwhelmed in the killing his dudes back department. Hence this thread and my other thread about crew selection versus Arcanists.

[Mxbedlam]

Arcanists is a tough match up for most Neverborn, but Zoraida can take them down. Definitely do not leave home without a nurse. She will become the model your opponent wastes massive amounts of AP to take down everytime.  Also, one of the more fun things about Zoraida is that she's a swamp fiend herself. Nothing's more fun than seeing a triumphant opponent's face turn to horror as he realizes he just unleashed a Bad Juju right next to his squishy leader. 

[cursingbulldog]

If you know your opponent is unlikely to paralyze you a eternal fiend bad juju and a couple waldgiest can really disrupt an opponents plans the first turn or two. Try to deploy second and put all three 6 inches off their deployment and hopefully in charge range of some of their scheme runners. Juju probably works better blocking the waldgiest from your opponents heavy hitters and trying to do damage and get taken out before either of the others gets taken out so he can take their place. Hopefully by the time all three are downed you've kept runner engaged for a couple of turn and got your severe terrain down to slow who's left down further.

[Ludvig]

If you're light on swampfiends (or want to live dangerously ) you can use him with Fears given form and Mimic's blessing instead of Eternal fiend. Use obey/lure/Graves to get him closer to bunched up enemies without activating and then run up and tie them down and (0) Avalanche late in turn 1. He's decent at holding people down and causing AoE-dmg this way without even attacking. Worst case you drain the enemy hand with the checks and have an easier time getting attacks through.

 

Considering his damage spread I would say that focusing one strike is often a lot better than using two attacks in a turn. As a general rule you need to at least focus to have any hope of getting anything other than weak damage.

[Bodiless]

I agree, getting him Focus or some other damage buff looks to be key. I'm used to beatsticks with higher minimum damage (Mature, Teddy, Illuminated vs Brilliance) which I think is part of what is throwing me off with Juju. I was ready to give up on him after my last game but now I think operator error has been mostly to blame.

[StaticVortex]

<entirely incorrect line of thought edited out>  *goes for coffee

If your opponents are inclined to avoid killing your models in order to deny you Juju....perhaps you could use that to your favor with engagement or scheme running?

[Bodiless]

Hmm. Doesn't Juju need a dead Swampfiend to appear?

[StaticVortex]

Hmm. Doesn't Juju need a dead Swampfiend to appear?

Oh that's right!  You are correct....I had gotten the mechanic for Killjoy twisted in my head.  

[Bodiless]

That's a pretty nasty Dreamer trick though - I will definitely steal that.