Smoke and shadows/occupy their turf

[rvdbarnes]

Has anyone had any success with this combo at all?

its quite an AP sink, but could bring some nice early VP.

 

What would come first, the unbury of the last blossom or the scheme VP Calculation?

[Gottkaiser]

The rulebook specifies on page 32 that "end of turn" effects occur first. After they have been handled, VPs are awarded. So you could use it the way you intended.

[Yvarre]

I've tried it for a few strats and schemes that involve positioning, and it just doesn't work when you don't have the right suit.  It can be incredibly powerful if it does work, especially with doom spider in our model pool, but I'd bank on our excessive mobility and movement tricks before Smoke and Shadows.  Wandering river monks come to mind, as well as many minions with McCabe (Doggies!).  Even a Torakage with a badge of speed would be an easier bet for me than Smoke and Shadows.  Shen Long and Sensei Yu are also more than capable support for a crew to achieve this scheme.

[Skitt_Happens]

I've tried it for occupy their turf, and it went slightly wrong because I did it turn 1 and had to survive a Nekima/Lilith assault for a turn.

Very successfully used it for public demonstration: my opponent did me a solid by charging the Joro turn 2. It's doable, but remember to wait till turn 2, use turn 1 to stack your hand.

[Definitechoice]

It works fine, but you definitely need a back-up in case the cards go against you. The smoke bombs are actually incredibly useful for making sure your minions survive the turn. 

[rvdbarnes]

Looking at it, I guess you can chain them together at the end of the turn too rather than all within range of your unbury beacon.

ie - place the first unbury, you then have another friendly model available for your next unbury.

This will make it much easier to get good positioning on the bigger things such as 50mm jorogumo 

[OneLittleThunder]

I did some math/theoryfaux about this a while back:

...and concluded that it's a nice bonus if you have the cards, but is too inconsistent/expensive to really plan your strategy around. YMMV, of course.

[InvokeChaos]

2 hours ago, OneLittleThunder said:

I did some math/theoryfaux about this a while back:

...and concluded that it's a nice bonus if you have the cards, but is too inconsistent/expensive to really plan your strategy around. YMMV, of course.

Seconding this. Much like the Yan Lo chi trick, you have to gauge the field nad your cards and be willing to abandon the concept if they aren't in your favor.

And yes, don't forget to wait for the proper turn!  

On 8/12/2016 at 0:51 PM, Yvarre said:

I've tried it for a few strats and schemes that involve positioning, and it just doesn't work when you don't have the right suit.  It can be incredibly powerful if it does work, especially with doom spider in our model pool, but I'd bank on our excessive mobility and movement tricks before Smoke and Shadows.  Wandering river monks come to mind, as well as many minions with McCabe (Doggies!).  Even a Torakage with a badge of speed would be an easier bet for me than Smoke and Shadows.  Shen Long and Sensei Yu are also more than capable support for a crew to achieve this scheme.

I want to really draw attention to this, as the Smoke and Shadows is REALLY card intensive (think you need an 11). Even with the smoke bombs, it's still card intensive.

Now that being said, I do really like using the smoke bombs to set up a screen for my support, then diving in with a powerful minion or my Master to pop things up at the end of the round. This is why I really don't ever use this upgrade outside of Misaki. I get her deep in enemy lines pretty early. 

Just my two cents.

[Skitt_Happens]

7 hours ago, InvokeChaos said:

I want to really draw attention to this, as the Smoke and Shadows is REALLY card intensive (think you need an 11). Even with the smoke bombs, it's still card intensive.

Off the top of my head, requires a 6, or 8 with the smoke bombs. I think people tend to think it's harder than it is.

[InvokeChaos]

2 hours ago, Skitt_Happens said:

Off the top of my head, requires a 6, or 8 with the smoke bombs. I think people tend to think it's harder than it is.

(Full disclosure: Dont have cards near me, travelling for work) 

Actually the smoke bombs put the suit in for you. I think it's like an 8+ for smoke bombs and I stand corrected in that I think the shadow stride is like an 8. If smoke bombs go off you need a 6. Maybe its 6 and 4... But that 8+ for grenades can be rough.

But that means that for three minions you need 6 cards or 3 moderate . Not terrible but it requires planning and at least decent cards. And I wouldn't be trying to do this particular trick with only one or two minions.

You are totally right though it probably seems harder than it is.

[bfrench]

Just to clarify for the shadow stride you need a 6+.  On smoke bombs you need an 8+ to get it off and hit the trigger.  With the trigger you only need a 4+ of any suit to shadow stride.

 

It can work, but it's very corner case.

[InvokeChaos]

aha, the true numbers! thanks @bfrench 

[Drowsheep]

I've been contemplating an alpha strike, taking jorogumo and tengu.

 

walk and scheme marker, then activate a tengu, push, double walk. Then shadow stride all the jorogumo.

you're 15" forward out of zone from the tengu and get 6" more, so your threat range is 24" counting the jorogumo's melee (more if you stagger their strides, but my plan is to try and drop 2 or three on 1 target turn 1).

At this point, all theory, but I'd like to see if it's doable to take out a henchman or master early in the game when assassinate or bodyguard are in the mix.