M2e Colette

[Bengt]

Just now, Boomstick said:

Better to say Colette is more versatile then, since more players will be doing more than 3x Prompts a turn, so her style of play will expand beyond that narrow corridor (I'll admit, I've mostly seen this in newer players, but anything that lets me put my favorite master on the table with fewer rolled eyes in response is a good thing in my book).

That is just as wrong as saying Prompt is more versatile for exactly the same reason. Versatile is just not the word you are looking for. Some of the options in a given Colette Activation has been removed, she is weaker (even if by just a tiny sliver). Will she more fun to play against? Very possible!  

[spooky_squirrel]

1 minute ago, Bengt said:

That is just as wrong as saying Prompt is more versatile for exactly the same reason. Versatile is just not the word you are looking for. Some of the options in a given Colette Activation has been removed, she is weaker (even if by just a tiny sliver). Will she more fun to play against? Very possible!  

That last question is the key question, it's really the only question that matters in casual play.

In tournament play, that weaker by a sliver makes her require more skill and talent to play well into the same match-ups, requires mixing up the hiring pool a bit, and provides a more interesting experience for the opponent, learning opportunities for everyone involved, and for games that are being streamed or recorded for youtube: provides a far more interesting and fun game to follow. I like learning opportunities, so having a game I can learn something from is fun, even when I lose 10-2 because of a mistake I made early on. The only lesson to learn from playing against triple-prompted beater in a game is alpha strike the beater off the board or otherwise neutralize them.

[Boomstick]

6 minutes ago, Flint said:

So what if there is just, for example, already activated  Cassandra nearby because all other models was "Disappearing Acted" to different corners of board and suddenly big bad beater just jump near Colette. How versatile will be her prompt limit?

That's called "Don't leave yourself in that position." Colette is a force multiplier and as such needs to stay near enough her force to do her job. Personally, when I go Disappearing Act crazy, it's been to redeploy several models past/away from my opponent's planned violence, and Colette sends herself right after them to stay where she can help that squad, preferably while moving something else that's gone to that flank or that far into the backfield into her range again.

[Flint]

27 minutes ago, spooky_squirrel said:

However, there are some shortcuts you might consider. Union Miners, for instance, can spit out 5 scheme markers in their activation (at most 3 will be left at the end of the turn for scoring, so they're at least partially expendable). Each of those scheme markers becomes an additional AP for a nearby model, including the Union Miner, who can spit out two more, netting you a total of up to six additional AP for the cost of 2AP from Colette, because of one model (up to because we cannot count Colette or the Union Miner, and if you don't have enough models nearby they cannot benefit--hence get a lot of practice).

It's not about amount of scheme markers but position where are placed. Very rarely markers will be so close (1") from required models, unless You play very defensive game which is situational.

So far I see that prompt was limited because Howard Langston. I never used Howard Langston in my games and do not intend to, I am trying to point out that prompt limit may badly affect gameplay, especially when we are still looking for other interesting and versatile actions Colette could do. Limited prompt may also mean change of tactics for Colette since she will has to keep more of her crew near her, less scheme grabbers, less flanking actions etc.

[spooky_squirrel]

33 minutes ago, Flint said:

It's not about amount of scheme markers but position where are placed. Very rarely markers will be so close (1") from required models, unless You play very defensive game which is situational.

So far I see that prompt was limited because Howard Langston. I never used Howard Langston in my games and do not intend to, I am trying to point that prompt limit may badly affect gameplay, especially when we are still looking for other interesting and versatile actions Colette could do. Limited prompt may also meaning change of tactics for Colette since she will has to keep more of her crew near her, less scheme grabbers, less flanking actions etc.

Union Miners' False Claim lets you throw markers up to 3" away from them, which gives you a rather good bubble (roughly 9" diameter, including base sizes and range requirement to the marker). You don't necessarily need to play defensively, but you do need to plan and practice to get good at using this. The composition of the crew matters a great deal in how it will work out, as someone like Angelica getting an extra AP could use that AP to push the Union Miner 5" (leaving him near one of the False Claim markers) so that he can burn that one to toss out two more to a pair of models further out that are more important to get extra work out of.

Howard Langston was the biggest offender, but he's not the only thing that was being triple prompted. You may not use Hank, but many tournament players were, and the triple-prompted Hank was not only one dimensional, it was having a negative effect on gameplay. As was mentioned on another thread, Howard Langston has a job that he's good at that makes him worth 12 stones base, and rather than make him worse at the job he might be hired to do for other masters when the biggest problem is him in a Colette crew, the limit on prompt addresses where the problem comes from.
If you're not hiring Howard Langston for prompting, you have spare stones for hiring other things that can be prompted as needed (only once per turn) to do work outside of killing.

As for keeping people close to Colette: prompt is a 10" range. Her aura that makes her the best scheme master in the game is 8". If you are playing her to her strengths, your crew is already well within her prompt range. It's not limiting her tactics, because her biggest strengths call for having people within 8" of her. Using All Together Now actually extends the range at which she can influence the board, because it's every friendly model that has a scheme marker near it.

Unlike some other table top games, tabling your opponent does not automatically make you the winner. To win, you must play to the strategy and schemes and score more VP than your opponent (maximum 10, typically). To do this, you select a master that does well into the pool and hire a crew that will do the work. If you're playing to win, every AP spent should be working towards the win conditions, and every extra AP you can get to do this matters.
Ideally, no single master will be able to take all comers into all schemes and strategies with the same crew--Malifaux uses the mechanic of hiring your crew after you learn the win conditions and what faction you are facing, and a single do-it-all master/crew combination breaks that paradigm. Are there still masters that will do well into most schemes and strategies with a largely fixed hired crew? Yeah, but there's trade offs in the strat/scheme pool. For instance, the most common offender is a summoning list. If Hunting Party and Last Stand are in the pool (GG2017), that summoning list is giving up 6VP to their opponent just for being a summoning list. This is even more severe than GG2016. This is also just one example.

[Mxbedlam]

Oh man I dropped Howard 3 prompt fast when I discovered Envy. He's been my main prompt target for a while and Howard goes off to scour the board of anything envy can't reach

[Flint]

10 hours ago, spooky_squirrel said:

Union Miners' False Claim lets you throw markers up to 3" away from them, which gives you a rather good bubble (roughly 9" diameter, including base sizes and range requirement to the marker). You don't necessarily need to play defensively, but you do need to plan and practice to get good at using this. The composition of the crew matters a great deal in how it will work out, as someone like Angelica getting an extra AP could use that AP to push the Union Miner 5" (leaving him near one of the False Claim markers) so that he can burn that one to toss out two more to a pair of models further out that are more important to get extra work out of.

Howard Langston was the biggest offender, but he's not the only thing that was being triple prompted. You may not use Hank, but many tournament players were, and the triple-prompted Hank was not only one dimensional, it was having a negative effect on gameplay. As was mentioned on another thread, Howard Langston has a job that he's good at that makes him worth 12 stones base, and rather than make him worse at the job he might be hired to do for other masters when the biggest problem is him in a Colette crew, the limit on prompt addresses where the problem comes from.
If you're not hiring Howard Langston for prompting, you have spare stones for hiring other things that can be prompted as needed (only once per turn) to do work outside of killing.

As for keeping people close to Colette: prompt is a 10" range. Her aura that makes her the best scheme master in the game is 8". If you are playing her to her strengths, your crew is already well within her prompt range. It's not limiting her tactics, because her biggest strengths call for having people within 8" of her. Using All Together Now actually extends the range at which she can influence the board, because it's every friendly model that has a scheme marker near it.

Unlike some other table top games, tabling your opponent does not automatically make you the winner. To win, you must play to the strategy and schemes and score more VP than your opponent (maximum 10, typically). To do this, you select a master that does well into the pool and hire a crew that will do the work. If you're playing to win, every AP spent should be working towards the win conditions, and every extra AP you can get to do this matters.
Ideally, no single master will be able to take all comers into all schemes and strategies with the same crew--Malifaux uses the mechanic of hiring your crew after you learn the win conditions and what faction you are facing, and a single do-it-all master/crew combination breaks that paradigm. Are there still masters that will do well into most schemes and strategies with a largely fixed hired crew? Yeah, but there's trade offs in the strat/scheme pool. For instance, the most common offender is a summoning list. If Hunting Party and Last Stand are in the pool (GG2017), that summoning list is giving up 6VP to their opponent just for being a summoning list. This is even more severe than GG2016. This is also just one example.

About markers and Miners: it is still situational, and intentions might be quite clear for opponent. This action will be used once per game anyway.

Please clarify: target for prompt needs LoS? if yes then it needs to be used on very empty table. Rarely your 10" bubble has no LoS restrictions.

Please also see the difference between limited Colette (by limiting prompt) and limited player (3xprompt on Langston, even if other options available).

I know about playing for VP, so since Colette was never very killy master it was always about manoeuvrability. Now it is restricted for her.

[spooky_squirrel]

On 1/2/2017 at 8:20 PM, Flint said:

About markers and Miners: it is still situational, and intentions might be quite clear for opponent. This action will be used once per game anyway.

Please clarify: target for prompt needs LoS? if yes then it needs to be used on very empty table. Rarely your 10" bubble has no LoS restrictions.

Please also see the difference between limited Colette (by limiting prompt) and limited player (3xprompt on Langston, even if other options available).

I know about playing for VP, so since Colette was never very killy master it was always about manoeuvrability. Now it is restricted for her.

"Situational" is why you design for it. If you don't design for it you won't get a lot of work out of it; you've spent 2 soul stones for the ability to summon Mechanical Doves. One thing that's important to note is that Showgirls and Minions can drop scheme markers as a (0) interact action provided they're within Colette's Rehearsed ability aura. I mentioned the Union Miner because it lets you do it as the second activation of the turn. Union Miner goes first, Colette goes second. Opponent gets one activation to respond. Otherwise, you do it later in the turn (activate Colette last) and get as many extra AP as you have models or scheme markers (which ever is lower). Even this doesn't broadcast, because you've got your choice of 2 out of 5 schemes from the scheme pool, and Colette's crew works off of scheme markers in other ways, including moving the markers around, moving the crew around or discarding them for buffs and debuffs. Your opponent has to guess whether you are setting up for schemes, setting up for buffs, setting up for debuffs, or setting up for extra AP, and the thing is: you can be setting all of these up at the same time in the first turn. Depending on how your opponent plays, you can literally switch your intent whenever you want. Whether you use it once per game or manage to finagle it out a couple of times, it is a force multiplier. Something to bear in mind is that it does not have a TN to go off. It just happens.

"Target" means it requires range and LOS. Rehearsed aura for the option to treat (1) interacts as (0) interacts also requires LOS. Again, if you're using Colette for her scheme-related strengths, this is not a new limitation. To better understand the power of this, a beater like Cassandra or Howard Langston playing into Headhunter can charge a target that's within (8 + 3" + base size of Cassandra/Hank) of Colette, kill it, kick the head to be within (aura + base size) of Colette, nimble-walk to base contact with the head marker, with their nearest edge to Colette being at the edge of the aura effect, and pick up the head as a (0) action and score you a VP out of their single activation, just for doing it near Colette. 
Requiring LOS does not require a "very empty table", it requires taking the terrain into consideration and playing on a table that has a good mix of Dense, Blocking, and varied height terrain pieces--which is what you should be doing in the first place. It's the exact same thing that all shooter and controller crews have to take into consideration. If your table is set up right, even a 2" pulse/aura may have LOS restrictions. Part of the game is accounting for the terrain, exploiting it to the best of your ability. If you are really concerned about LOS restricting options, the Union Miner's False Claim does not require LOS, and neither does All Together Now.

Colette loves to scheme far and away better than most everyone else. She enables her entire crew to do it, and with her range of abilities and hiring options, she has very few problems into strategy/scheme pools that require interacting and moving. This is quite clear in her abilities, synergies, and upgrades. Limiting Prompt limits Colette's player's ability to get a lot more out of a single model; it forces Colette players who have been using multiple prompts on a single target to rethink their plan for the health of the game. Before you let it get to you, it might help to realize that other models have been more severely limited from their original printing in M2e for the health of the game as well.

Colette, as mentioned in the previous paragraph is a scheming master. Her shtick is not killing things, but scheming and being slippery. She can still kill stuff, and quite effectively if she wants to, but if you're looking for the raw kill stuff like no one's business kind of master, Rasputina and Marcus fill that role much better. Colette is the schemer that uses various control measures to get more work out of her whole crew.

 

The thought that many people have that Colette is somehow useless because she cannot prompt a single model multiple times in a turn indicates that too many people have been ignoring the rest of her card. It is quite literally a self-imposed limitation.

 

If you still want Colette to be some kind of super-prompter, trying running a core of:
Colette
Cassandra
Carlos
Emissary
Envy

That gives her four targets for her Prompt, and Cassandra can understudy Prompt to target the one Colette missed, or even target Colette herself. It's 35 stones without upgrades, which leaves room to include other things like Angelica, Malifaux Raptor or Mechanical Dove, and a handful of useful upgrades. You get to avoid the Union Miner, and your prompt options are all very good prompt options that can get a lot of work done.

I would recommend branching out even from this, because it ignores the rest of what she can do.

[Fazza92]

yesterday I tried Colette with the new bad Prompt,I win 9 /4 against Rasputina.

Take the stash,leave your mark and search the ruins GG2017.

I play with:Colette(cabareth and Shell game),Cassandra(practiced and imbued protection),2 Coryphee,mannequin,performer and Emissary...

I've found two good scheme for Colette.

I don't have hear too limited the new errata'Colette...

Only one time I would need prompt 2 time Cassy to attack with Saber...but that list can give me more target for prompt...

[Adran]

On 02/01/2017 at 5:18 PM, Flint said:

So what if there is just, for example, already activated  Cassandra nearby because all other models was "Disappearing Acted" to different corners of board and suddenly big bad beater just jump near Colette. How versatile will be her prompt limit?

I've killed a healthy Marcus with just Colette (without using prompt because nothing was left near enough. It did take 2 turns, but I was able to survive Marcus and a cerberus attacking her). So I'm not concerned about her prompt limit being a problem in your proposed situation. . 

[Mxbedlam]

Or just disappearing act Colette away from the beater and they've wasted their AP. Colette shouldn't die unless EVERYTHING else in your crew is dead. 

[Bengt]

22 minutes ago, Mrbedlam said:

Colette shouldn't die unless EVERYTHING else in your crew is dead. 

Or someone that ignores triggers is after her, or she got lured/pushed away first. Some crews don't really have that hard a time killing Colette.

[spooky_squirrel]

2 hours ago, Bengt said:

Or someone that ignores triggers is after her, or she got lured/pushed away first. Some crews don't really have that hard a time killing Colette.

Here in the Arcanists we have a couple of things that would take her apart. Joss getting in close combat with her is a bad day for her because no triggers, nothing but soulstones damage prevention to delay the inevitable. Then there's the Arcane Emissary charging in, blowing up scheme markers and shoving Colette around. She's slippery, but she's not quite as Mission Impossible to kill for some. Nightmare Neverborn builds could be using Teddy's throw and follow-up trigger on the attack to get her away from showgirls and markers, Gremlins have a few models that have bowling-over attacks.

3 hours ago, Mrbedlam said:

Or just disappearing act Colette away from the beater and they've wasted their AP. Colette shouldn't die unless EVERYTHING else in your crew is dead. 

Colette has escape routes if you're bringing enough models to keep scheme markers on the board. My question is, how did a beefy beater surprise you and get so close to Colette?
The original question has a serious flaw in it to begin with: if those models were just Disappearing Act-placed up the board, Colette has already activated and no matter what's on her card for tactical/attack actions, she's not going to get to go again unless someone kills a Performer next to her. If they were Disappearing Act-placed up the board in a previous turn, canny play would have replaced at least one of those markers so that models would not be left in isolation and a Colette player with experience outside of prompt (x3) already knows to leave markers all over the place (read: it would have been a mistake not to replace at least one of them), which means that when Malifaux Beater Delux 9001 pops up next to Colette and you have the option to activate her before it can do its thing, and as @Mrbedlam suggested: she Disappears 14" up the board. MBD9001 is left holding the bag in a snipe hunt.

One of the best ways I've seen to learn a tricky master is to forget that something iconic about them exists. Neverborn players in my meta and elsewhere have found that if they forget Lilith's sword and Dreamer's Nightmare summoning for the first dozen or so games, they learn a lot about the rest of the card and what can make those masters so effective. Here in the Arcanists we can use a similar learning tool for masters like Colette. Rather than get upset about prompt being limited, play a dozen or so games with Colette in which you never use prompt. Make note of how your crew composition changes and what impact it has on how you play, don't be afraid to make some mistakes and take some chances trying out some things that look iffy--you're learning the master. Don't wish you could prompt, don't remind yourself that she has prompt; play like that ability is not on her card.

After that dozen or so games, you will hopefully have a better sense of what else she can do, when she likes to activate for those other things, and what things work well with her. Once you've reached this point, you'll find your reliance on prompt is reduced. You and your opponent will also have a far more interesting game, win or lose--which is good for the game overall.

[Mxbedlam]

One of my favorite things to do is catch people off guard with a huge turn of All Together now. My favorite one had 3 mages, an acolyte,  2 silent ones and Cassandra all go off on the enemy at the top of turn 3. It was Shenanigans I tell you

[spooky_squirrel]

1 hour ago, Mrbedlam said:

One of my favorite things to do is catch people off guard with a huge turn of All Together now. My favorite one had 3 mages, an acolyte,  2 silent ones and Cassandra all go off on the enemy at the top of turn 3. It was Shenanigans I tell you

This is the sort of thing I'm talking about. If you can manage to get All Together Now to go off on Silent Ones and December Acolytes, you're getting a lot more bang for your buck, especially if there's an Ice Gamin giving them Bite of Winter. The Acolytes hand out slow as part of their attack, and Silent Ones have a trigger to attack again (closed loop). You're gaining a huge edge in AP for the cost of a little set up.

I mention "if you can manage" because December Acolytes cannot Interact in the first turn due to their From the Shadows ability, so they'll need to play back some and you'll have to shunt a marker up to each one (if you brought more than one Acolyte) for them to do it. This can be done in a number of ways, Practiced Production for one, a Performer/Mannequin pair (Performer Walks, Mannequin follows, repeat, (0) for the marker, tossing it up to the Acolyte somewhere near the centerline of the board).
What makes this more interesting from my point of view is the always available scheme: Claim Jump. Your opponent might play conservatively to not get frostbitten by Colette's Show on Ice, or aggressively to jam and limit the Claim Jump, or ignore your set up and do their thing. If they pick (a), no ATN barrage this turn. If they pick (b), you get to spring a trap that isn't just the scheme anymore. If they pick (c), what you get depends heavily on what they're doing: you might get to spring your trap, or you might just sit on those markers for Claim Jump or an early turn two crescendo.

 

Distribute the workload to things that never seem to get enough work done on their own, yet have good things that they do.

[Bengt]

Another pair of weaknesses in Colette's defences are that Death Defying provides healing so things like Decaying Aura or Glimpse the Inevitable blocks it, and Now You See me provides reduction so while you can get away you will still loose some of your precious 8 Wd to an attack that ignores that. And while ignoring reduction used to be rare in favour of just ignoring armour it has become more common with wave 4.

---

What models are there, across the factions, that can block triggers (obviously you can also get around it with various blast and pulses)?

• Joss
• Union Miner
• Arcane Emissary with Marcus' conflux
• Ohaguro Bettari
• Sensei Yu
• Kaeris/Zipp by targeting Ht
• Retribution's Eye
• The Valedictorian/Students

[Mxbedlam]

Without a doubt Ohaguro Bettari is a worry vs Colette. She can get across the board, ignore terrain, stop triggers, prevent soulstones and flay into severes. On that list she is probably the one I'd be THE most scared of. 

[spooky_squirrel]

@Bengt and @Mrbedlam

Betty and the less obvious threats are great motivators to figure out more about how to use Colette than prompting all the time, especially prompting a single obvious choice like Howard Langston or Envy. If she's spamming Prompt, she's holding still. When I play for kills, I like to work my opponent into a trap, isolating targets and limiting reprisals, and a model that is holding still while everything else moves makes for an easy target.

One of the problems to solve in course of a game is "what do I do if [model] dies?" This is true for every single one of our "crutch" models. If you bring Howard Langston to do a job and he dies, what's your backup plan? If you bring the Mechanical Rider and she dies, what's your backup plan? If you're counting on Prompt and the prompt target or Colette dies, what's your backup plan?

That's the thing that shapes my preference for using Colette as a control support piece for the crew as a whole, instead of ramping up one or two models. The crew is there to get the work done, Colette is there to make it easier. If she dies, the crew can still get the work done, but it will be harder. So the trick for me is to make sure that if my opponent kills Colette, it puts them in a position where it's just as hard for them to get stuff done as it is me.

[Flint]

3 hours ago, spooky_squirrel said:

Colette has escape routes if you're bringing enough models to keep scheme markers on the board. My question is, how did a beefy beater surprise you and get so close to Colette?
The original question has a serious flaw in it to begin with: if those models were just Disappearing Act-placed up the board, Colette has already activated and no matter what's on her card for tactical/attack actions, she's not going to get to go again unless someone kills a Performer next to her. If they were Disappearing Act-placed up the board in a previous turn, canny play would have replaced at least one of those markers so that models would not be left in isolation and a Colette player with experience outside of prompt (x3) already knows to leave markers all over the place (read: it would have been a mistake not to replace at least one of them), which means that when Malifaux Beater Delux 9001 pops up next to Colette and you have the option to activate her before it can do its thing, and as @Mrbedlam suggested: she Disappears 14" up the board. MBD9001 is left holding the bag in a snipe hunt.

One of the best ways I've seen to learn a tricky master is to forget that something iconic about them exists. Neverborn players in my meta and elsewhere have found that if they forget Lilith's sword and Dreamer's Nightmare summoning for the first dozen or so games, they learn a lot about the rest of the card and what can make those masters so effective. Here in the Arcanists we can use a similar learning tool for masters like Colette. Rather than get upset about prompt being limited, play a dozen or so games with Colette in which you never use prompt. Make note of how your crew composition changes and what impact it has on how you play, don't be afraid to make some mistakes and take some chances trying out some things that look iffy--you're learning the master. Don't wish you could prompt, don't remind yourself that she has prompt; play like that ability is not on her card.

After that dozen or so games, you will hopefully have a better sense of what else she can do, when she likes to activate for those other things, and what things work well with her. Once you've reached this point, you'll find your reliance on prompt is reduced. You and your opponent will also have a far more interesting game, win or lose--which is good for the game overall.

Beefy beater can surprise Colette using her own scheme markers, like Executioners do. They are killy and df triggers cancellers (overall: very ani-Colette). Or Vicent St. Claire can shoot her with help of Light in the end. By the way: can she cast Disappearing Act on herself (if she survive attacker's action of course, she's quite fragile without df triggers)?

Setting stage for All Together Now might be easily read by opponent, and with wave 4 models all these scheme markers can be a trap for Colette herself. Old Prompt, even if obvious, is still dangerous.

3 hours ago, spooky_squirrel said:

One of the best ways I've seen to learn a tricky master is to forget that something iconic about them exists. Neverborn players in my meta and elsewhere have found that if they forget Lilith's sword and Dreamer's Nightmare summoning for the first dozen or so games, they learn a lot about the rest of the card and what can make those masters so effective. Here in the Arcanists we can use a similar learning tool for masters like Colette. Rather than get upset about prompt being limited, play a dozen or so games with Colette in which you never use prompt. Make note of how your crew composition changes and what impact it has on how you play, don't be afraid to make some mistakes and take some chances trying out some things that look iffy--you're learning the master. Don't wish you could prompt, don't remind yourself that she has prompt; play like that ability is not on her card.

After that dozen or so games, you will hopefully have a better sense of what else she can do, when she likes to activate for those other things, and what things work well with her. Once you've reached this point, you'll find your reliance on prompt is reduced. You and your opponent will also have a far more interesting game, win or lose--which is good for the game overall.

It's nice that You mentioned Lilith, so let's compare the ladies. Besides Broadsword attack, Lilith has Vines that can stop scheme runners within everywhere 12" (no LoS required). Shadows can be used to place own crew within 6" for offensive or blocking purposes within 12" (again no LoS required). What has Colette without Prompt? Disappearing Act, range 3 for own crew (how many own models do You keep within 3"?), range 14" LoS required... Prompt is the only master-class action Colette has, that's why limiting it hurts so badly. And please do not try to convince anyone that limiting Prompt is beneficial to her. It gives nothing in exchange.

[spooky_squirrel]

If your opponent is reading you setting up All Together Now and you're being surprised by those models, that's not something Colette can be blamed for. It means that your opponent knows your master better than you do and that you might not have enough experience against those models.

Yes, she can Disappear herself up the board. She can also stone to prevent damage. If something gets to her that blocks triggers, damage reduction, and damage prevention, she becomes very squishy very fast. So do other masters. The same beaters that tear her down in a hurry can also mess them up severely.

Lilith can stop up to as many models as she spends AP and succeeds against. However, it is a condition, and thus can be ignored outright by tools we have in faction. It stops movement and charges, but not pushes and places. She is limited by her board position, and in spite of being dangerous in close combat is generally easier to kill than Colette, because it doesn't require isolating her or disabling her triggers.

If you truly believe that the only thing Colette has to offer is prompt, then it looks like you're not paying attention and it looks like you're not interested in trying anything else. The fact of the matter is there is a great deal more that she does, and that she's unpredictable because she can literally be using scheme markers for anything. Some of the Wave 4 masters are anti-scheme marker, yes, but that doesn't change the fact that Colette can use them. It just makes it so that the Colette player needs to be more careful with their set up. New stuff should encourage new approaches to play.

 

I have had great success with Colette in competitive games without needing to prompt more than a handful of times in a game. This means that I have a bias because limiting prompt like this does not require changing my own playstyle very much. People who played a much more predictable, albeit killy, Colette crew featuring a beater or two who rely on triple prompting will be adversely affected. However, last time I played a mirror match with my interpretation of Colette versus a triple-prompter at a tournament, they lost their primary prompt target first turn and Cassandra second turn and had no idea what to do for the rest of the game because they could not see beyond the Prompt action.

This is why I feel that limiting prompt is beneficial. Not because it improves Colette's card, but because it forces people to improve on how they play Colette and it helps move away from mono-builds. As I commented not too long ago on a Guild thread: health of the game isn't just whether or not someone gets tabled in turn two or blown away by a crew and literally cannot figure out how to work around it; it also has to do with stagnation, variations in play, and player growth.

[Flint]

1 hour ago, spooky_squirrel said:

If your opponent is reading you setting up All Together Now and you're being surprised by those models, that's not something Colette can be blamed for. It means that your opponent knows your master better than you do and that you might not have enough experience against those models.

Right now it is easier to predict than before, just because one of the options (Prompting 2nd tie same target) is disabled.

1 hour ago, spooky_squirrel said:

Yes, she can Disappear herself up the board. She can also stone to prevent damage. If something gets to her that blocks triggers, damage reduction, and damage prevention, she becomes very squishy very fast. So do other masters. The same beaters that tear her down in a hurry can also mess them up severely.

Using soulstones is available for all masters, so it doesn't make her better or worse. Thing is that she does not have passive df abilities (Armor, Hard to Kill etc.) or large amount of Wd, or any aggresive actions that would deter potential attackers.

1 hour ago, spooky_squirrel said:

Lilith can stop up to as many models as she spends AP and succeeds against. However, it is a condition, and thus can be ignored outright by tools we have in faction. It stops movement and charges, but not pushes and places. She is limited by her board position, and in spite of being dangerous in close combat is generally easier to kill than Colette, because it doesn't require isolating her or disabling her triggers.

It's still unrestricted 12" bubble, many scheme runners will think before going into that. Pushing affected by Vines cost 3dmg, might be quite a lot for scheme runners. And retaliation, if Lilith survives, is scary.

1 hour ago, spooky_squirrel said:

If you truly believe that the only thing Colette has to offer is prompt, then it looks like you're not paying attention and it looks like you're not interested in trying anything else. The fact of the matter is there is a great deal more that she does, and that she's unpredictable because she can literally be using scheme markers for anything. Some of the Wave 4 masters are anti-scheme marker, yes, but that doesn't change the fact that Colette can use them. It just makes it so that the Colette player needs to be more careful with their set up. New stuff should encourage new approaches to play.

Please show me the post where I wrote that Prompt is the only thing she has to offer. I wrote that this is the only master-class action she can do. Please answer a question: if she gained so much unpredictability and things to do then she could not do that before Prompt limit. Yes or no?

1 hour ago, spooky_squirrel said:

I have had great success with Colette in competitive games without needing to prompt more than a handful of times in a game. This means that I have a bias because limiting prompt like this does not require changing my own playstyle very much. People who played a much more predictable, albeit killy, Colette crew featuring a beater or two who rely on triple prompting will be adversely affected. However, last time I played a mirror match with my interpretation of Colette versus a triple-prompter at a tournament, they lost their primary prompt target first turn and Cassandra second turn and had no idea what to do for the rest of the game because they could not see beyond the Prompt action.

This is why I feel that limiting prompt is beneficial. Not because it improves Colette's card, but because it forces people to improve on how they play Colette and it helps move away from mono-builds. As I commented not too long ago on a Guild thread: health of the game isn't just whether or not someone gets tabled in turn two or blown away by a crew and literally cannot figure out how to work around it; it also has to do with stagnation, variations in play, and player growth.

I am happy with Your success in competitive games without prompting same target many times, and Your wins against "multiprompters" and monobuilds. That means this is not such powerful combo as everybody describes and do not need limiting.  

Prompt use limit makes Colette more predictable, opponent knows that one of the possible options is now out. It is different thing than predictable player.

It is the players problem that they stuck with same "multiprompting" tactics, they will be easily predicted, easily beaten and will learn that it do not work any more. Then they will learn other stuff Colette can do.

Well, this is the two different ways to achieve such thing like player growth, avoiding stagnation and introducing more variations in games. One is when players will see their results  (beaten again because he was so obvious) and develop this internal feeling and will to improve. That usually comes with enthusiasm and happiness when discovering  new things by themselves . Other way is to force him to is: You Will change your playstyle or else... And this is for Greater Good!

Maybe the problem is on the other side. Maybe other players do not know how to deal with monobuilders and do not want to learn it expecting that the rules will change to their favour without making any effort to improve their playstyle?

[osoi]

Thing is the prompt change brings it into line with other similar abilities in the game such as any obeys and Sandeep's copy ability. Its healthy for the game and Colette has a lot of tricks that dont just rely on triple prompting, sure thats easy but I'm almost certain you are not getting the most out of her when you do that. I'm happy with the change.

[spooky_squirrel]

1 hour ago, Flint said:

Please show me the post where I wrote that Prompt is the only thing she has to offer. I wrote that this is the only master-class action she can do. Please answer a question: if she gained so much unpredictability and things to do then she could not do that before Prompt limit. Yes or no?

I am happy with Your success in competitive games without prompting same target many times, and Your wins against "multiprompters" and monobuilds. That means this is not such powerful combo as everybody describes and do not need limiting.  

Prompt use limit makes Colette more predictable, opponent knows that one of the possible options is now out. It is different thing than predictable player.

It is the players problem that they stuck with same "multiprompting" tactics, they will be easily predicted, easily beaten and will learn that it do not work any more. Then they will learn other stuff Colette can do. 

Saying that it's the only master-class action she can do implies that it is the only thing she has to offer. Especially when combined with complaints about being limited by LOS and 10", when her biggest passive buff to the crew also requires LOS and has a shorter range.

She could do all the things I described before Prompt was limited, but for tournament play, most players were not practicing those. They went with a beater like Howard Langston and relied on prompting him multiple times. The better players learned to rely on prompt less when their beaters would disappear, but many in my local and extended meta (which is the greater Seattle Area) would switch to another master instead of trying to learn the more complex parts of Colette's game. They subscribed to a common attitude that the only thing Colette had to offer was prompting, because it was the simplest and most direct thing on her card, and when it worked it worked really well.

What makes her more unpredictable is the fact that now when an opponent drops Colette into a strategy and scheme pool at a tournament, you can no longer safely bet that she's going to prompt the biggest beater as much as she can. With the update to schemes for GG2017, there's a whole new batch of interactions for people to figure out. As I've already said multiple times: when she drops scheme markers, she can drop them for AP from All Together Now, but she can also drop them for buffing her own crew or debuffing the opponent's crew. She could be dropping them for a scheme that scores where those markers are at now, or dropping them to move them to where they will score later on when there's little-to-nothing that can be done about it. These make her unpredictable and always have been on the card, but many players ignored that about her because prompting a single target multiple times was very simple to set up and use and had great return with the right prompt targets.

This has been my point this entire time. People could learn other ways to play her, but had no reason to and thus would not. When their favorite trick stopped working because their local meta started alpha-striking the prompt target off of the table, they switched to another master instead of playing Colette in the way that her fluff and design indicate she was meant to play.

That's not really good for the game, as it promotes the idea that the only master-class action/ability Colette brings is prompting.

She's actually a superb schemer and works really well with a crew of 8-9 minion/showgirl models into almost every strat/scheme combination that gets flipped, because even the ones that require killing are not out of reach with Coryphee and Cassandra in theme and getting extra AP out of models that function like glass cannons--the biggest flaw with using her this way is that it is a lot harder to figure out all the nuance involved, which requires more practice and patience, as well as a willingness to lose a lot of games because it is finesse play and mistakes in finesse play are costly.
I happily drop her with a minion-heavy crew into Hunting Party, because when those Performers die, they reactivate nearby minions and showgirls. Sure, my opponent gets a VP for killing it, but I get another activation out of Angelica, Coryphee Duet, Carlos, Cassandra, or Colette unless there's something more important for a minion to be doing, like a Union Miner spitting out 5 more scheme markers (3 stay after upkeep) in order to score 3 off of Set Up or Hidden Trap when there's little-to-nothing further my opponent can do to stop it.

[Bengt]

5 hours ago, osoi said:

Thing is the prompt change brings it into line with other similar abilities in the game such as any obeys and Sandeep's copy ability. Its healthy for the game and Colette has a lot of tricks that dont just rely on triple prompting, sure thats easy but I'm almost certain you are not getting the most out of her when you do that. I'm happy with the change.

Obey can be used multiple time on the same target, it's only restricted with taking Attack actions. It can also be used on enemies, which, while it is less reliable, can have very powerful effects at the right time. Personally I don't think Sandeep's ability is anything like prompt/obey since it shifts AP in the opposite direction.

5 hours ago, spooky_squirrel said:

What makes her more unpredictable is the fact that now when an opponent drops Colette into a strategy and scheme pool at a tournament, you can no longer safely bet that she's going to prompt the biggest beater as much as she can.

There was no guarantee she would do that before either. In fact if people expected her to do that before and the Colette player didn't, the Colette player could gain advantage from the surprise, which is a lot less likely to happen now as Colette has lost one of her play styles.

5 hours ago, spooky_squirrel said:

debuffing the opponent's crew

As someone who likes to take a Performer in any crew (they are mercenaries after all...) I wouldn't give Colette credit for this.  

[spooky_squirrel]

10 minutes ago, Bengt said:

There was no guarantee she would do that before either. In fact if people expected her to do that before and the Colette player didn't, the Colette player could gain advantage from the surprise, which is a lot less likely to happen now as Colette has lost one of her play styles.

As someone who likes to take a Performer in any crew (they are mercenaries after all...) I wouldn't give Colette credit for this.  

On the first point: you're right, there wasn't. I was one of the people that would only prompt 2-3 times in a game total. I'm also one of the few Arcanist players that I know that doesn't take Arcane Reservoir with every master

Performers can join every crew, absolutely. In Colette's care, they can (0) to lob the marker at the feet of their target before using it to seduce them as a (1), then lure them in with the second (1).