Zoraida Crew Fix

[Mununkulus]

Hi! I've run Zoraida the last couple of games with the following list:

Zoraida, McTavish, Bad Juju, Teddy, Nurse and a Silurid. 

The list work pretty decently, but in the end, I usually lost by a smal margin, mostly because I got outactivated. So I wanna replace one of my bigger models, who fall way too easily because of their defense of only 3 and get some more activations in the mix. What would you suggest to awitch in there. I tend to take out Juju since he has been the least effective member of the crew.

Thx for your feedbacks!

[Mununkulus]

the upgrades i use differ from S/S, atleast the zoraida ones. On McT or Juju i use Fears Given Form to keep McT a little safer or ram Juju in my opponents face. The game plan is usually also dependable on the strat and schemes. Generally I park my biggies in the middle, so they can go for SoF or similar ones and my silurid runs around placing markers. Nurse for either doll abuse - paralyze or to boost my melee attacks. 

What I'm looking for is rather more models to activate than another beat stick. Something to give me more control while not being some squishy target I have access to everything, or can buy anything if need be.

[goth]

Do you use the voodoo doll a lot, OP?

Otherwise the nurse could be something else.

Silurid is expensive, so is Bad Juju.  I guess it depends on schemes, but I wouldn't want to take Bad Juju without eternal fiend, and even then your swampfiends are all very resilient.

[Vorschlag]

In my opinion you have far too many expensive models in that list and most crews will simply out activate you and pick one off a turn, at least that's how I succeed against lists like this.
For me Zoraida is a go to, almost a crutch in fact as she has never lost me a competitive game, the fact that wisps buffed her will probably cause more pain and suffering in my meta.

The way I would change your list is to drop teddy and take 2 more swamp fiends so gator, waldgiest, gupps, wild-boar or if you don't mind proxies the wisp.
The additional swamp fiends will both buff McTavish and give Juju more value as he will have more opportunities to come back, I normally rush him at large groups with obeys and have eternal fiend and fears given form on him.
Your opponent is then forced to lose resources, either cards, stones or models to get rid of juju before any of your other models are committed or left too open to enemy fire (using cover effectively).

McTavish in the mean time will buff more of your crew and gain more benefit from firing into combat where swampfiends are involved.

Zoraida -  tarot reading  + hex bag  =3
Bad Juju - eternal fiend + fears given form =11
McTavish - fears given form =11
silurid 7
Waldgiest 6
Nurse - 6
wild boar -6

Still a low model count but when you're taking two henchmen without a swarm that is to be expected, summoning the doll should but you just below anyone not running a swarm or a summoner.

The waldgiest and Mctavish with give you protection from ranged enemies via hunting screen and germinate +the swamp is our home (be careful with this due to fears given form)
The wild boar will "hopefully" counter snipers - always set up second. 
bad juju, waldgiest or nurse can all be used for doll abuse.
Silurid is still your prime scheme runner and can help with  McTavishes Gator-snack or with the right spread can setup vp with a second model +fickle winds of fate                                                                                                                                        

Additional options:
drop the silurid, the nurse and fears given form on McTavish for 14 stones and replace them with:

2 gupps and a gator +1 stones in the cache
The gator can skill paralyze the doll, just not as effectively as the nurse (nurse can paralyze two models per turn with doll abuse and one with her own action) the gator can only paralyze once a turn but will do damage + adds flexibility as a s w amp fiend.
The gupps will buff McTavish and when they die they will buff all nearby swampfiends, + they are reasonable scheme runners.

2 gators and a gupp
reasons  above, main reason for this choice would be if you expect your opponent to go after McTavish or Zoraida in hand to hand.
The two gators hanging back for paralyzing the dolls will act as a bodyguard for whichever model you feel is threatened should you need to change tact.

2 gupps a gator and hexed among you
in this case I would also drop the wild boar for a second waldgiest
The major thing here is that hexed will allow you another way of dropping juju in someones face or setting up a swampload of swampfiends to buff McTavish or in the gupps case die and buff all your models.
This is also an option for dealing with the sniper crutch (the kind of player that always takes two snipers) - again always set up last.

I haven't included wisps as I haven't tried them yet and am unsure on how you stand on proxies.

[feagaur]

I think it depends which way you want to play her. The good thing with Zoraida is you can play just about anything with her.

If you're going for an obey-centric Zoraida I'd drop Mctavish and the silurid and go with Doppleganger and two Insidious Madness. You might not have as many models but you've got plenty of hurt to put out and reduce you're opponents crew size.

If you're going for swampfiends, I'd drop Teddy and Silurid and take the spawn mother and a couple of Gupps. Gupps are great scheme runners and its always fun when they get their grow trigger and you unbury Juju.

[Mununkulus]

in the 2nd case, do you start Juju burried or do you run him into your opponents face early on, hoping he dies so that he burries and can come back ? I've tried that twice and my opponent either only killed everything else (Perdita crew) or killed Juju and then messed up all my schemes with his scheme runners (gremlin with many pigs)

 

i really like the mobility of McT with his Gator Snack (0) and the fact that he can deal pain from ranged and in melee. So the idea of dropping him is not something that makes me feel happy. Adding the Spawnmother and Gupps could indeed solve all my problems.

 

i also read that Iggy would be great for doll abuse. What would a good list including him and I guess nurse look like ?

[orkdork]

With wisps, Zoraida is one of our most powerful masters now. I posted a list a while back that is absolutely nasty, to the point that I don't play it outside of tournament play anymore (or tournament preparation). It's heinously powerful, and actually not fun for opponents that aren't playing highly-tuned lists, as it can table them by turn 3 without them having any recourse.

Played without either wisps or specifically strong builds, Zoraida is lacking. That's why they gave her the wisps

Bad Juju is weak with Zoraida, because she can't really help him with his biggest flaw: mobility. Lilith can move him ~22" in a single AP, completely ignoring terrain the whole way, including LOS! Zoraida? Needs a 7 to give him a walk of 4".

Starting him buried only really works with wisps using from the shadows, because they are cheap and annoying enough that your opponent can't afford to just ignore them.

McTavish is OP, and awesome with Zoraida. Getting rid of him will almost never actually improve your list.

[HegemonyKrcket]

1 hour ago, orkdork said:

With wisps, Zoraida is one of our most powerful masters now. I posted a list a while back that is absolutely nasty, to the point that I don't play it outside of tournament play anymore (or tournament preparation). It's heinously powerful, and actually not fun for opponents that aren't playing highly-tuned lists, as it can table them by turn 3 without them having any recourse.

I'll mail you a cookie if you link to this list.  :-)

[HegemonyKrcket]

1 hour ago, orkdork said:

With wisps, Zoraida is one of our most powerful masters now. I posted a list a while back that is absolutely nasty, to the point that I don't play it outside of tournament play anymore (or tournament preparation). It's heinously powerful, and actually not fun for opponents that aren't playing highly-tuned lists, as it can table them by turn 3 without them having any recourse.

I'll mail you a cookie if you link to this list.  :-)

[feagaur]

7 hours ago, Mununkulus said:

in the 2nd case, do you start Juju burried or do you run him into your opponents face early on, hoping he dies so that he burries and can come back ? I've tried that twice and my opponent either only killed everything else (Perdita crew) or killed Juju and then messed up all my schemes with his scheme runners (gremlin with many pigs)

 

i really like the mobility of McT with his Gator Snack (0) and the fact that he can deal pain from ranged and in melee. So the idea of dropping him is not something that makes me feel happy. Adding the Spawnmother and Gupps could indeed solve all my problems.

 

i also read that Iggy would be great for doll abuse. What would a good list including him and I guess nurse look like ?

I'd always start Juju on the board. Although fairly slow he can dish out a fair amount of damage and a few conditions. He's also fairly durable so you want him in your opponents face as quick as you can. Plus if your opponents concentrating on him the rest of the crew can do what they need to. If they ignore him he lays down his hurt. 

Mctavish is great but he has his place. If I want to base the crew round WP duels and doing things round that I'd rather take Teddy or Juju for their terrifying.

and as soon as I can get my hands on some wisps I'll be playing them. 

I don't think I'd run Iggy and the nurse at the same time. I don't think you'd need to. You can only hem one model at a time and you don't want to put too much AP into it or it wouldn't be worth it.

[Vorschlag]

9 hours ago, Mununkulus said:

 

in the 2nd case, do you start Juju burried or do you run him into your opponents face early on,

 

That comes down to terrain, what the opponent is fielding and strategies and schemes.

If you're going to start with him buried you'll want something in your opponents face early.

Don't forget you can kill your own models if your opponent fails do so.

Basically if your expecting to make good use of eternal fiend you want to avoid spending many stones on non-swampfiends.

I personally think wisps may need to be looked at, as I already found Zoraida easy to win with and think wisps may take her overboar.

However that's all theoretical at this stage as I'm yet to put a proxy on the table for them.

[orkdork]

1 hour ago, Torsul said:

 

Yeah, it's the version later in the thread, with the spawn mother and wisps.