Metal Gamin Errata

[Sordid Strumpet]

I don't even understand what the debate is about any more. They will still require 2ap to kill from anything thats not a dedicated beatstick, even when summoned (and if dedicated beatsticks go after them they're not after something else). They can still go defensive 2 for free after dropping a scheme marker and guard it for the rest of the game.

and they can wander up to a big scrum in the middle of te board and give something defense 6. You just have to be a bit cleverer about where you put them. Maybe behind a house or a ht2 barrel/crate. They are percectly fine as they are now, and not no brainers any more as tey were before.

[Dirial]

I don't even understand what the debate is about any more.

[MR TORGUE]

...they still have ca8 for hoffman. Thats the main thing i was worried about when i heard erratas were incoming. 

I find it hard to believe that people are so upset with the balance they applied to m/gamin. Its really not that bad... 

Edited November 18, 2015 by tollstar_deluxe
update

[Suzakuni]

I still don't see how MI 4 1/2/3 dmg (with usually plenty of ways to deal with burning, is ever scary.)

the loss of Htk makes this gamin flat out inferior to the others due to now it will roughly die in the same amount of ap as the others, but without the added benefit of having any offensive presence. 

I wished they would have just gotten rid of magnetism and Pom.

 

[Dirial]

I still don't see how MI 4 1/2/3 dmg (with usually plenty of ways to deal with burning, is ever scary.)

the loss of Htk makes this gamin flat out inferior to the others due to now it will roughly die in the same amount of ap as the others, but without the added benefit of having any offensive presence. 

I wished they would have just gotten rid of magnetism and Pom.

 

Okay, I pretty much disagree on all you have just said. Perhaps it's best to leave it at that.

[Suzakuni]

I still don't see how MI 4 1/2/3 dmg (with usually plenty of ways to deal with burning, is ever scary.)

the loss of Htk makes this gamin flat out inferior to the others due to now it will roughly die in the same amount of ap as the others, but without the added benefit of having any offensive presence. 

I wished they would have just gotten rid of magnetism and Pom.

 

Okay, I pretty much disagree on all you have just said. Perhaps it's best to leave it at that.

ok, I can respect that. Plus, it doesn't matter since at the end of the day, the errata is final and this is now how the mg will be, despite my opinion

[dgraz]

Not sure what the exploit is with Leveticus but Hoffman was tested with their Ca 8 and the developer team knew about it from week one and chose to not change it so it is definetly meant to be that easy for him to cast his spells. 

Hoffman has Ca 8 without MG and gets Ca 10 with them, due to Empower. So if he was tested with Ca 8 it really seems like Magnetism Ca should be lowered...

You are incorrect. It was tested that way during an open beta where people used it. If it was a problem, it would have been sorted then. If it really was a problem, it would have been corrected when they corrected PoM.

The first assertion assumes that all testing is flawless, which is ridiculous. But sure, Justin doesn't currently seem to think it's a problem.

Seriously bro? You're just picking at words now. He WAS tested with Metal Gamin....so was at the Ca 10 most of the open beta.

I don't assume that all testing is flawless....if it was, the Gamin wouldn't have gotten through as it was....but it is something that was looked at pretty strongly and people were intentionally trying to break it....idk, maybe you weren't involved.

[Ludvig]

Not sure what the exploit is with Leveticus but Hoffman was tested with their Ca 8 and the developer team knew about it from week one and chose to not change it so it is definetly meant to be that easy for him to cast his spells. 

Hoffman has Ca 8 without MG and gets Ca 10 with them, due to Empower. So if he was tested with Ca 8 it really seems like Magnetism Ca should be lowered...

You are incorrect. It was tested that way during an open beta where people used it. If it was a problem, it would have been sorted then. If it really was a problem, it would have been corrected when they corrected PoM.

The first assertion assumes that all testing is flawless, which is ridiculous. But sure, Justin doesn't currently seem to think it's a problem.

I am quite positive that during the playtest of Hoffman people used the metal gamin to get to Ca 10 and reported it to Justin so it isn't unintended. I haven't heard many people actually having much trouble with facing Hoffman and he has been around since first edition so I'm not sure he is OP or unenjoyable to face.

It does seem that problems have slipped through previous playtests so as a blanket statement Dgraz' comment seems odd. In this case Dgraz' comment was however in direct response to another post in this discussion. The specific interaction mentioned was known by the devs and obviously not deemed needing of a change at the time of errata. In fact they have known about it for almost two years so, to me at least, it would seem strange to assume it slipped their mind instead of it being intended.

[Rurouni Benshin]

1. Htk with armor 2 is amazingly strong, however I believe this was balanced due to the walk 4, and an almost useless melee atk meaning it was only good at staying alive longer than its other brethren. If an opponent needed to get away from it it could, it demanded no presence, and if killing it was important, than it would die after enough as was sunk into killing it. Honestly if Pom and magnetism was removed instead of Htk, I honestly would not have had an issue, as it is now, I can't see myself hiring them due to more offensive, proactive models now that I cannot rely on its ability to survive.

 

2.  I hate that since other factions/models/mechanics as reasoning for Cuddling the gamin. If these other op situations are created with what other models are doing with them, why doesn't the "fix" start with that area instead of going to the original, "non op" element that became abused later.

1.  I can't speak for other Arcanist players (or non-Arcanist players, since they're hirable/summonable from other factions), but 99% of the time I use Metal Gamin are BECAUSE I use Magnetism.  It doesn't always work out that I play against Constructs, but if I match up to a faction that's known for them, and if I have an out of faction Master (Mine being Mei Feng and Levi) that have access to them, I take them.  Ca 8 against any Df has a great chance of working, and it's an easy (probably the easiest) way of dealing 2 damage.  I never actually used PoM on itself, so I can't speak to how useful/OP that was, but looking back on it, it's certainly a justifiable change.  They basically went from being an "auto-include" model to being "a well rounded" model when playing a Master with access to them.

2.  Again, I'm not so sure it was because of the out of faction Masters that abused them too much.  I've seen a fair share of Arcanist Masters exploit them a lot too, especially if you play the Mechanical Rider.  Paired off with Ramos, you've got an average of 2-3 summoned models per turn for the entire game, nevermind the fact that they can be hired within the faction already.  You may not think that Ml 4 is very good, but when you have enough models swarming you, you're bound to get hit enough times for it to make a difference.

[Breng77]

In general I have not noticed the change much.  It feels like the biggest thing now is deciding which gamin to summon with Mech rider instead of defaulting to the metal gamin.

[RarerMonsters]

I think summon spam like that is a bigger issue in that it dramatically slows down games

[Rurouni Benshin]

I think summon spam like that is a bigger issue in that it dramatically slows down games

I think this varies more from player to player.  True, that by adding more models to the table, you're adding more activations, but for an experienced player, the additional activations are pretty cut and dry and easily decided. 

[Suzakuni]

On the fact of the mech rider summoning. It still can. You are still getting more things summoned including spiders. So that doesn't really target the mg Cuddle, and as far as I know, I believe the mech rider can still summon so that particular issue still exists

[Rurouni Benshin]

On the fact of the mech rider summoning. It still can. You are still getting more things summoned including spiders. So that doesn't really target the mg Cuddle, and as far as I know, I believe the mech rider can still summon so that particular issue still exists

Not exactly sure what it is you're trying to address here, but it seems like you're saying that the Mech Rider being able to summon may be a reason for the MG errata?  (Correct me if I'm wrong though)  And if that isn't the case, how is the fact that the Mech Rider being able summon not an issue to address concerning the MG errata?

For me, unless I was playing the Mech Rider with Ramos, the model I'd be summoning 9/10 of the time will still be a Metal Gamin.  My logic: Having any kind of "Armor" is better than not having it for a model that comes out with 2 Wds remaining.

[Suzakuni]

I saw that people were mentioning the rider summoning and I was confused as why it was being brought up as well, as that particular mechanic was not involved with this errata.

 

also, the only 4 point minion the rider can summon with no armor is the electrical creation. So all our summon ankles have 1 armor. The difference now is the others had more offensive uses and without Htk, the metal only has 1 extra armor

[Rurouni Benshin]

also, the only 4 point minion the rider can summon with no armor is the electrical creation. So all our summon ankles have 1 armor. The difference now is the others had more offensive uses and without Htk, the metal only has 1 extra armor

I think you just justified the errata with that comment right there.

 

[Dirial]

Against a model with Weak 3, that Armor makes a big difference.

I'm just glad that the Mech Rider cannot summon a 6SS minion any more.

[Suzakuni]

also, the only 4 point minion the rider can summon with no armor is the electrical creation. So all our summon ankles have 1 armor. The difference now is the others had more offensive uses and without Htk, the metal only has 1 extra armor

I think you just justified the errata with that comment right there.

 

can you explain? The sacrifice of speed and offense is what made Htk ok.

[Suzakuni]

Against a model with Weak 3, that Armor makes a big difference.

I'm just glad that the Mech Rider cannot summon a 6SS minion any more.

I never have thought of the mg as a 6 pT minion. Can you explain?

[Dirial]

I never have thought of the mg as a 6 pT minion. Can you explain?

Okay, before they were Df 6, Armor 2, HtK models for 4 SS, which is way more than "solid defensive". In addition, they were Ml 4 weak damage 3 models which adds up pretty fast.

[Rurouni Benshin]

also, the only 4 point minion the rider can summon with no armor is the electrical creation. So all our summon ankles have 1 armor. The difference now is the others had more offensive uses and without Htk, the metal only has 1 extra armor

I think you just justified the errata with that comment right there.

 

can you explain? The sacrifice of speed and offense is what made Htk ok.

Because when the Mech Rider summoned a model, it would take 2 damage upon being summoned.  Previously when the Metal Gamin had HtK, it was the (nearly) "auto-summon", since it guaranteed (most of the time) that it would require 2 hits to kill.  Any other Gamin (or 4 ss construct) had the risk of being killed in a single action (or a (0) action, if you were facing against other Metal Gamin).

Now that HtK is removed, it makes the choosing amongst all the Gamin a more involved decision making process.  For me personally, and just about all the other Arcanist players I've played against, it's pretty much always been the Metal Gamin up to this point.  Hence the logic for removing HtK.  While it had HtK, the Armor value was never relevant since it always came out with 2 Wds.  And when faced with the choices that were available then, the Metal Gamin was sure to be the most resilient.  Now (all of a sudden), people have (get) to choose which Gamin are better suited for the situation at hand.

My previous logic for always taking the Metal Gamin:  It required at least 2 actions to kill it, whether it be (0), (1), or (2) AP actions.  Now with the errata, the meta has changed, and if I can be frank, justifiably so.

[Suzakuni]

Well the defense 6 matched the spider so I don't see that as an issue, plus with Pom out of the way in general it would no longer be an issue. With walk and charge of 4 and a 1 inch engagement you knew well in advance if the bugger was coming and with ML4 you chose if you wanted to attack it, or get a disengaging strike to move to more important parts of the battlefield. 

 

And Pom adding burning wasn't really relied on seeing as ml4 was going to have to connect. And if the burning was really worrisome it could easily be removed. 

 

I dont care care about Pom. And it sounds like its removal is more than enough to get rid of a lot of the issues that was with it (burning dmg and extra def).  I would have been fine at this point, and heck I would have even tossed in the magnetism or reducing its cast to maybe a 5 like other 4 point minions.  But the loss of Htk to me is what is unnecessary 

[Breng77]

Yeah I think the rider is a big deal for the change.  Previously you would summon a metal gamin as it typically could take a lot of abuse, throw in some healing and it became a super solid free model.

[katadder]

not actually sure why people classed metal gamin as OP?

yes they were good summons for the mech rider (another model that massively under performs IMO) as they could survive 2 hits but apart from being road blocks they never seem to do alot being very slow so no good as scheme runners and not much good for killing stuff. the best thing they could do was defend a marker which with lures/pushs etc can be got around anyway. 

mi4 with 1/2/3 damage track isnt great and even the burning from PoM could be dealt with and thats after they slowed down even more by spending an ap putting pom up.

they are good against constructs due to the magnetism but thats niche anyway, personally look to spend 1pt more on rail workers (who have a good damage track and 0 ability) or molemen for the same

as for those saying they are of great use in TT with mei feng etc I am sure a TT Brother would be a better option and seem to be even harder to actually take down.

[Suzakuni]

If the rider situation is the case I wish that wyrd could have just done something with that instead of the mg. but tbh I wouldn't even know where to start to make that balanced without getting a different ability all together