Control McMourning

[Seb3110]

Had a game the other day with McMourning. I was playing against 10T, and the strat was Extraction. I took covered breakthrough and exhaust their forces. Misaki took exhaust their forces and Hunting Party.

He brought something along the line of:

Misaki (3 upgrades)

Lone Swordsman

Katanaka sniper

Thunder Archer

Toshiro

Ototo

 

I brought:

McMourning

Nurse Heartsbane

Judge

Orderly

Deathmarshal

Austringer

Pathfinder

Nurse

 

I went for full out control and didnt want to do alot of killing. We ended the game in turn 4, as we ran out of time. game would have ended 10-4 to McMourning.

I had Ototo stand still turn 2 and 3 thanks to nurse Heartsbane, and Misaki paralyzed turn 3 and 4 thanks to the nurse. I also boxed Toshiro one turn to make sure he didnt start summoning. 

Lessons learned: it is very hard and card intensive not to fight. This control type crew works best against elite crews. I was lucky with a few flips and card draws, which made my life a bit easier.

I was very happy with nurse Heartsbane, and she quickly got a huge mark on her back. She is very card intensive, and suit hungry.

Still have not gotten anything out of the Pathfinder.

Love the Austringers mainly for their discard card trigger and their deliver orders.

Nurses are fantastic...so many ways to shut down models.

1 Deathmarshal is alwasy good.

Orderlies are good scheme runners. With a nurse they can go up to walk 8, and you can push them around with McMourning without worrying about poison, since they heal a bit.

McMourning actually didnt do much this game appart from pushing people around and taking a charge from Ototo.

All in all it was a fun game, and a type of crew i don't usually run.

[Ludvig]

Sounds like a really fun build!

If you can't get the pathfinder to work you might try swapping for a hunter, they're super disruptive. The pathfinder will probably click for you when you get a high enough tome to summon traps into engagement with people in a couple of the early turns. It's also really inportant to consider the enemy threat range and place it in the perfect spot.

[LunarSol]

Very cool list.  Any thoughts what you'd take over the Pathfinder?  My gut says another Nuse or Austringer, but maybe a Stalker or another Orderly?

[lusciousmccabe]

Pathfinders I think are really good for inspection in corner deployment since they can set up camp there turn one and make it hard to approach. Apart from that I find they're in an awkward place where their range isn't long enough to keep them out of engagement and they're hard to keep alive if you don't get lucky with the tomes.

[Franchute]

Hi

I had my first game with McMourning a couple of weeks ago. I enjoyed it a lot, especially because of the control aspect of the game, as you suggest in your post. I tried something as follows:

- McMourning, with Evidence tampering and On the clock
- Zombie chihuahua
- Francisco, with Wade in
- Ryle
- Nurse
- Witchling stalker
- 2 x austringers
- Brutal effigy

I was against a Lilith list that looks somewhat like that:

-Lilith
-Cherub
-Barbaros
-Scion of black blood
-Doppleganger
-2 x Terror tots
-2 x Bloodwretch

The strategy was stake a claim. I took Entourage (Ryle) and plant explosives. My opponent had Entourage (Barbaros) and  Breakthrough. I did not reeval anything, while he revealed both schemes.

The one aspect I liked the most was the mobility I had with all the different pushes. Between Ryle's, Francisco's Enfrentate a mi, the austringers and especially McMourning's injection, I really felt at ease moving around the board. The nurse is fantastic too, for multiple reasons. However, I didn't take anything out of the poison. I dont know if I should completely skip this aspect of McMourning for the next game, by replacing Brutal effigy and the chihuahua, or introduce more things with poison and Sebastian. I'll definitely try the Nurse Hearthbane as you are suggesting. I already thought about her; I'm glad to hear about your confirmation.

[admiralvorkraft]

I really only use poison to push the good doctor around the board. Lean into his strengths and take the poison as a bonus rather than trying to make him work like his resser version.

My two cents at least.

[Franchute]

45 minutes ago, admiralvorkraft said:

I really only use poison to push the good doctor around the board. 

And how do you poison him typically?

[4thstringer]

I just tried a themey medical crew of the starter set, mcm, sebastian and a nurse.  Due to some lucky flips and high masks in hand nurse heartsbane tanked mei fang and miss step for 3 turns.  Mcm with an assist from sebastain wiped the rest of the crew from a crowded middle using poison and his make everyone undead aura, along with the occasional slung scalpel.  Granted my cards were amazing and my opponents were miserable, and the models in the middle relied on armor and htk to save them (effigy, metal gaiman, willy, kang, rail worker).  It was brutal.  But generally I would agree with admiral v that poison is mostly for pushes in guild.  The poison comes from a nurse first turn.

[admiralvorkraft]

15 hours ago, Franchute said:

And how do you poison him typically?

Nurse deploys just behind him, jabs him with an oversized syringe for Poison +4 and then usually gives something Uppers.

[4thstringer]

18 minutes ago, admiralvorkraft said:

Nurse deploys just behind him, jabs him with an oversized syringe for Poison +4 and then usually gives something Uppers.

Do you have trouble keeping the nurse up with the rest of the crew?  I've found that even with walking her once after poisoning Dougie, she is usually farther behind than I want her to be for the second turn (scheme/strat opponent reliant of course).

[admiralvorkraft]

The crew usually ends up splitting. Doug and a fast beater or a couple of schemers go off to kill something surgically (pun absolutely intended) or establish my schemes while the bulk of the crew fights over the strat.

The nurse is plenty fast enough to keep up with a Peacekeeper or similar.

[Ludvig]

17 hours ago, 4thstringer said:

(...) and the models in the middle relied on armor and htk to save them (effigy, metal gaiman, willy, kang, rail worker).  It was brutal. (...)

You are aware that McMourning ignores armour and hard to wound but not hard to kill right? Rereading this I got sort of confused. Although the armour is a big part of why some of those models are survivable and poison at the end of the turn is beautiful against htk.

[Munindk]

Cant read, cant type.

[Ludvig]

3 minutes ago, Munindk said:

Cant read, cant type.

It ain't easy being Danish 

[4thstringer]

2 hours ago, Ludvig said:

You are aware that McMourning ignores armour and hard to wound but not hard to kill right? Rereading this I got sort of confused. Although the armour is a big part of why some of those models are survivable and poison at the end of the turn is beautiful against htk.

I actually forgot he ignores htw.  The Htk was dealt with with infect poison at the start of their activation with catalyst.

[Seb3110]

If playing a similar list, i Would probably go for a hunter or austringer over the pathfinder. Hunter for slow and pulls, and austringer for card discard....really love that trigger. Another nurse could come in to play aswell, but NOT as often as the other two i Think. It Was a really fun Way to play him, since most of what i did Was focused around not fighting. I dont play him around prison at all, but more as a support buffer/speed bump if needed. Its also fairy Nice if you have the cards, to take your nurse and give the doctor +2dg, and then scalpel sling him in to a heavy High wound/low df model. 4 attacks With week dg. 4 is nasty. And ofc auto poison for htk targets.

[trikk]

3 hours ago, Seb3110 said:

[...], and austringer for card discard....really love that trigger.[...]

I never managed to get that trigger. Never-ever.... 

I lost faith in my austringer so I just usually deliver orders to Sonnia

[Gnomezilla]

There's usually too much other fun to be had with a mask in hand to give it to the austringer, anyway. In my model pool that fun is pushes, but extra attacks certainly look like fun too. Or maybe your austringer is like mine and will refuse to cooperate with a particular master, in your case Sonnia? I swear, before I fielded him with McCabe, I was on the verge of returning that mini to its previous owner.

[Durza]

12 hours ago, Seb3110 said:

If playing a similar list, i Would probably go for a hunter or austringer over the pathfinder. Hunter for slow and pulls, and austringer for card discard....really love that trigger. Another nurse could come in to play aswell, but NOT as often as the other two i Think. It Was a really fun Way to play him, since most of what i did Was focused around not fighting. I dont play him around prison at all, but more as a support buffer/speed bump if needed. Its also fairy Nice if you have the cards, to take your nurse and give the doctor +2dg, and then scalpel sling him in to a heavy High wound/low df model. 4 attacks With week dg. 4 is nasty. And ofc auto poison for htk targets.

You can't actually scalpel sling if you give him the +2 damage,  as scalpel sling isn't a Ml action, it's an action that lets you take his Ml attack at range. What you can do is give him poison and have him near Sebastion so he pushes over without actually walking.

[Seb3110]

Aaah, thats good to know Thanks

[4thstringer]

2 hours ago, Durza said:

You can't actually scalpel sling if you give him the +2 damage,  as scalpel sling isn't a Ml action, it's an action that lets you take his Ml attack at range. What you can do is give him poison and have him near Sebastion so he pushes over without actually walking.

Are you sure on that?  Since you are testing using his ml it should be a ml attack.

[Durza]

The way I read it is if you declare scalpel slingin', you perform the (0) which says take a Ml action, the (0) has to be taken first, it's not a Ml attack itself, it lets you take one.

[4thstringer]

I like traps for control too.  They rarely kill anything, but they slow your opponent down, force them to deal with them to get through, use up their cards on the slow duel, and best of all, are valid targets for on the order of the governors secretary if your opponent blows by them. 

[Seb3110]

On 5/5/2016 at 2:42 PM, Durza said:

The way I read it is if you declare scalpel slingin', you perform the (0) which says take a Ml action, the (0) has to be taken first, it's not a Ml attack itself, it lets you take one.

After reading it again i totally agree with this. I have played it wrong until i must admit.