The Dreamer must die

[Muchoghoul]

I was hoping for some help playing against The Dreamer using Seamus or Molly.  One of my primary opponents has been wiping the floor with me using the same list almost every time.
  The core of the list looks something like this:

Summoning Dreamer

Coppelius

Teddy

Widow Weaver

 

I've experimented with some different lists, but I keep coming up against the same problems.  The low willpower of my models, lowered further by daydreams and web markers, prevents me from even attacking his guys without a 13 in my hand.  I end up with Teddy in my back line and Copp on my flanks tearing me a new one.  Any help in removing my opponents smug look of satisfaction would be much appreciated. 

 

[Kogan Style]

Lure! Get the Belles pulling the Lil' git out from  his 3" bubble means he can't pass off the damage. For Zfiend style humour teleport Seamus in after and stone for crows to keep slapping the Dreamer to death.

Sybelle with her shriek can bounce a blast from a day dream onto Dreamer if positioned correctly. 

Molly dropping punk zombies to slice n dice as well as black blood can cause him pain.

 

[kross1]

Night Terrors will reduce the range of all his casting actions. Then push Yin into his face. Then attack him as directly as possible. Due this correctly and you will cripple his ability to achieve anything and usually ends with a dead Dreamer in short order.

[Phototropic]

izamu and flesh constructs ability to ignore wp duels is useful, but don't really synergise with your masters unfortunately

[EnternalVoid]

The Dreamer is a little monster in his own way.  So several things.

First do not expect Luring to actually pull the Dreamer forward unless you can fire off a couple tries or do leg work in advance to make sure he cannot stop it.  The dreamer can pass off Attack Actions that target Wp as well as Df with his trigger, just no built in Mask for Wp.  That said any low mask card or a SS can solve that.  A good Dreamer player will start setting up a model behind his master so when he passes the lure off it will move around the dreamer and still be within the 3" range for a second lure.  Now this is not saying Lure is a bad idea, in fact it is a great idea for different reasons. The flip side here is that it leads into the Real weakness of the Dreamer, his Hand. 

Like most summoners the requirements for his summons are steep and can easily eat strong cards from his hand.  When combined though with his trigger to protect him and you get a real resource drain.  The Dreamer has to discard a card to pass the action off to a nightmare, meaning if he drops a low mask to do it and then passes it off he already has dropped 1/3rd of his hand.  Get the trigger on the Belles to force a discard and you now have taken half his hand.  Add into this him dropping even one card for summoning and he is down to 2 cards.

In the list you have outlined he has tried to make up for this to an extent with extensive use of Terrifying to limit the attacks on his crew.  But it is a ball, the Web Markers can only come out 1 a turn and cannot move meaning he has to build his playground and get you into it.  Add into this that Daydreams need to be within 4" makes it even tighter.  In addition he is using 32ss just for that core not counting any other upgrades save for the Summoning one and daydreams.  I suspect he tries to pad his list for activation after this primarily with daydreams and summons.  From your opening post I suspect you might be suffering partially from your model selection, as you only list Seamus and Molly as your masters.  That might have a factor in your problems. 

For Molly the best course would be to summon as many cheap grunts into the middle of his ball as possible early on.  The Wp15 duel will be rough for most of the models you listed to pass, more so if he has already cheated in the turn.  The main target would be Daydreams as they only have 2wds and would die from two failures *plus have Wp4 so need an 11 to pass*.  Even Dreamer needs an 8+ to pass.  Her Totem is a possible choice as it only needs a 6 of Mask to go off and gets a 10" range rather than a 6".  You might be able to pick off a couple daydreams unless he is really lucky or willing to drop cards.  Also remember if you park a model directly on top of a Web marker it will not be able to affect any of your other models as they will not be able to draw LOS to the marker.  If you can tie up his models and kill his daydreams he will have tough choices.  To get his models out of combat he will have to either kill them or use AP to push his guys around.  With the daydreams mostly gone he might have to rely on AP from the Dreamer if he wants pushes or summon more daydreams.  Also as your lures are pretty good range you should be able to target them from outside any minuses so it is possible to draw models out of his bubble.  If I had a choice on which I would go with the Widow Weaver as once it is gone he loses his most likely mechanic for minuses and likely main sort of card recover.  If his hand is low enough though target the dreamer to give him a good scare.  If the Dreamer has taken any damage from summons or black blood you know he will be worried about assassination.

For Seamus I can see two routes.  The first is the surgical strike.  His Wp is high enough and range good enough on his gun you should not have problems with him being able to pop a shot off.  With two severe cards in hand you should not have to much trouble reducing one of his models to less then half wounds.  The prime contender to me again would be the Widow Weaver though being a SS user it could spend it on Defense to give you a negative to your damage flip to cancel out the focus.  Still it would be likely cheating up and spending SS so it might eat a lot of resources.  Though Coppelius is also an option as you might be able to ruin him and get a chance at finishing him before he can heal to much.  At that point he would likely be trying to get Teddy or Coppelius after Seamus, but if you are in the right position at least Teddy will not have a strait charge.  And if he uses pushes to try and get the charge you can always lure your own Seamus back away.  The second would be the Mad Bomber route with Corpse bloat and Sinister Rep.  Seamus with Corpse Bloat is a scary thought for models that might be grouping up.  Not only can he drop a Corpse as a (0), but he can heal from them failing their Wp tests.  As it is a tactical action and not an attack action Dreamer cannot pass it off and as it is not Melee or Shooting his incorporeal will not help.  With 5 damage he has to fear you blowing two corpses up and taking out several models.  In the Mad Bomber route I would consider having a couple little grunts to die for you and litter their corpses among his guys.  After Seamus can jump in and as long as you have two 9+ in hand and two corpses you can generate a lot of Wp duels and possible damage.

I would supplement all these plans with two belles to insure you can put pressure on the Dreamer with Lure actions.  Even if you cannot lure him you can force him to lose cards, or if he is hiding behind something you can always pull something out of the Bubble and work on dismantling it.  Pulling two Daydreams *also possible getting triggers to discard cards* to remove forces him to either summon new ones or go with out.

[Fetid Strumpet]

I second targeting the weaver early with Seamus. Personally I don't bother focusing against SS users, for the reasons mentioned above. That doesn't mean you can't fire the gun and then hit her with live for pain. Also summoner dreamer often counts on his healing aura, so to make killing the weaver easier and mess around with that healing aura you might consider taking decaying aura on Seamus as well.

[Muchoghoul]

Holy smokes!  Tons of good stuff here.  Never even occurred to me to cover up a web marker with a model...  

Thank you very much for the replies.  Hoping to get a chance to try some of this out in the next two weeks.  Suposed to start a campaign this weekend, but the dreamer player, who the rest of us refer to lovingly as "F that guy", is a no show.  I'll let you all know how I do next time we play.

Thanks again.

[oryxwild]

There's no shortage of written and podcasted advice on how to build lists and play them out there. Nevertheless, reading this I felt a rare sense of satisfaction. This advice was so clear and sequential to me. Thanks for breaking it down!