2017 Errata - Dawn of Lucius ^^

[Ludvig]

21 minutes ago, Tris said:

Actually, I´m probably ok with the Death Marshals as they are (although I´m not against any buffs :p) but would like to see a usable Governors Proxy

I mean, it would even make sense lore wise, as a new Governor means a new proxy, am I right?

And Marlow for sure doesn`t want to be represented by that useless bold guy...

 

Just to break up your discussion a little bit^^

That totem is atotal trainwreck. The thing I use it for is to proxy the scribe since I have metsl Lucius.

[Ludvig]

@JDAntoine

Austringers are extremely good in Justice crews as well since they force discards, help with positioning and get schemes done. Justice's buff to attacks after killing helps all minions so there's really nothing stopping her from not running marshals. Francisco also offers her more than the Judge does. Justice also has a use of getting pushed out of fruitless engagements with unfavourable targets although maybe not as critical as Sonnia. I frequently see Perdita with austringers and she already has pushes for both her and her themstic crew. The only master I haven't heard/seen using them that frequently is Hoffman. With the change to austringers they could also pick out enemies engaged with Justice to let her spend her ap on targets with more wounds left.

 Any ability death marshals got that was useful for Justice would probably help Perdita and Sonnia just as much so wouldn't necessrily promote her use. She likes Francisco with hermanos but so does most guild masters so why not take him with one of the others? She needs to have something unique to her other than an extra point of damage (that doesn't even ignore defensive abilities so against armour she is often doing the same damage as Perdita). 

[JDAntoine]

6 minutes ago, Tris said:

I doubt that Schemes&Strats could up the appearance of totems, they would need very strange wording to achieve that.

Which totems do you think are hit/miss, throughout the factions? ->don´t want to derail my own thread, just a little bit bored and curious

I don't think it would need very strange wording, it remains to be a type and while it's almost a subtype it remains a rather clear one  
I could go trough all factions but will keep it Guild related (sorry):

Hit:
Enslaved Nephilim
Mechanical Attendant
The Scribe (2017 version!)
Luna
Zombie Chihuahua
Miss:
Scales of Justice 
Purifying Flame 
Governor's Proxy 

For the most part the ones I do not like too much cost 3 and just don't seem significantly better as a lot of cost 2 totems. Obviously this differs per Master as some totems are an extention of their power but for the ones who arn't that I think a reconsideration of damage output or cost is something to think about.

Now this isn't to say everything needs to be different regarding Totems, I feel that they too became slightly better with the years and Cost 3 to 2 is a big difference in being able to just fit it in versus not. 

[Tris]

Purifying Flame is solely a playstyle thing I suppose, I find it very strong just for the 3 that says "no" to all prevention flips - it has to be played aggressively and you need to target the right things, but than it`s even more game over for your opponent^^

 

Otherwise - yeah, I talked about the Proxy, and the scales could use a power up too, I suppose

But overall, the list doesn`t look that bad for us Guildies, doesn`t it?

[JDAntoine]

29 minutes ago, Ludvig said:

@JDAntoine

Austringers are extremely good in Justice crews as well since they force discards, help with positioning and get schemes done. Justice's buff to attacks after killing helps all minions so there's really nothing stopping her from not running marshals. Francisco also offers her more than the Judge does. Justice also has a use of getting pushed out of fruitless engagements with unfavourable targets although maybe not as critical as Sonnia. I frequently see Perdita with austringers and she already has pushes for both her and her themstic crew. The only master I haven't heard/seen using them that frequently is Hoffman. With the change to austringers they could also pick out enemies engaged with Justice to let her spend her ap on targets with more wounds left.

 Any ability death marshals got that was useful for Justice would probably help Perdita and Sonnia just as much so wouldn't necessrily promote her use. She likes Francisco with hermanos but so does most guild masters so why not take him with one of the others? She needs to have something unique to her other than an extra point of damage (that doesn't even ignore defensive abilities so against armour she is often doing the same damage as Perdita). 

Austringers are extremely good, full stop, that is the point I'm making . I also believe that the Austringer "cuddle" was held back way too long, to the point where we had a in-effective Lucius.
When Minions are good they will see use. The same applies for every other type of model aswell and since there is no restriction on those, you will always gravitate towards those who feel cheaper or closer to the design you wish they had.

I dissagree with the premise that Death Marshals becomming better would not significantly assist Lady Justice better. There is a very simple reason for that and that is the sub-type support the different Masters give out. What I mean with this is that Family is distinctly better with Perdita, the result of this is that they are a common inclusion. Lady Justice does have Guild Marshal support allready which in a vacume most certainly is good but what isn't too good is the mayority of Guild Marshal choices. 

Thanks to the Death Marshal Recruiter you are capable of gaining a massive survivability boost to Lady Justice, this is great. In order to make the most use out of it however you'll also want to include more Guild Marshal's, such as The Judge or a Death Marshal. In general though the great use for a DMR is exclusive to Lady J. Likewise an improvement to the DM will improve a typical Lady J build much more as it will with Sonnia or Perdita, by large because they are not specifically looking for that kind of support/interaction due to threat range. 

The difference between what Francisco does and a Death Marshal does is also too large but I can give you a very simple conclusion as to why Francisco is very popular and the Death Marshal isn't.
- Francisco gives a statistic boost to every type of model you wish (including Masters) and is very cheap to boot. You get a premium henchmen which not only is good but also boosts others.
- Death Marshal (now) has lost the biggest attraction of his utility Pine Box, while you can still add him and use him, now more than ever he's limited to his Ca 5 and rng 1 Pine Box, by large because the function to protect other models has drastically decreased. You can still do it but the best models you could do this with do not interact with this utility anymore  .

Lastly the Austringer is put back in his 6 SS norm, the Death Marshal with ideal balance should also be on that norm and I have the distinct feeling he currently is not there.
He used to be with Papa utility where the Death Marshal alone would allow for a 'body guard'.

 

[Ludvig]

22 minutes ago, Tris said:

Purifying Flame is solely a playstyle thing I suppose, I find it very strong just for the 3 that says "no" to all prevention flips - it has to be played aggressively and you need to target the right things, but than it`s even more game over for your opponent^^

 

Otherwise - yeah, I talked about the Proxy, and the scales could use a power up too, I suppose

But overall, the list doesn`t look that bad for us Guildies, doesn`t it?

Compare the proxy to the pukesnake (primordial magic) and tell me why the proxy is the more expensive of the two... I mostly have a major issue with that.

Sonnia's totem has a nice ability but the problem with it is that it's expensive (there's an upgrade in ressers for 1ss that does the same thing I believe?) and that if you move it close to an enemy there's a very real chance that you can't shoot without randomizing which is annoying. It's defensive ability (incorp) also makes it a really dumb blasting point for Sonnia since she will instantly kill it. It should have been casting proof or something so she could at least blast from it twice, maybe also had a rule so she always hit it instead of other models near it so you could guarantue a blast without needing to beat cover. I would also be able to live with killing it in one shot it if it was always on fire instead of just reducing the damage and still loosing the condition at the end of the next turn. Being able to walk it through a wall on fire to blast stuff out of LoS just for a single attack would have meshed better with Sonnia's playstyle. It would also have been so much more useful to have it give burning at range instead of in melee. Sonnia doesn't use burning for her melee attacks but she does for her ranged ones. A range 10 sh/ca with no gun would have had a place in a Sonnia crew.

When will I use the ability to not suffer burning damage? Especially considering I will probably kill it with my next attack if I did set it on fire. As it stands I feel it is much better to take a watcher for one soulstone more, set it on fire with a witchling and use that as your blasting point since I can then skip randomization and ignore cover for the first attack which will result in everyone burning and me being able to shoot again with Sonnia ignoring LoS and cover. Bonus points since the watcher will survive for me to use it to scheme or repeat the targeting trick where the flame may have been randomized onto and killed by my first attack. It just seems like the design is all over the place with it. 

 

[Tris]

But still, I see it as viable enough to not warrant an errata - I still think that we shouldn`t errata everything just because getting the new information to the players is still ... tedious work at least.

 

And yeah, again, the Proxy is pure garbage, no argument there^^

But at least we actually don`t have the Neverborn/Gremlin problem, where everybody and his mother seems to only take Primordial/Cranky without even thinking if something else would be better/if it fits their playstyle

[Ludvig]

@JDAntoine

Justice gives marshals a charge push towards the model that she charged. I believe that is her entire interaction with the marshal subtype. If you have more than about two marshals they will collide and not get very far so it isn't exactly a super ability. Two master ap to move two-three other models up about one ap's worth, that's less impressive than current Lucius   I could use it to charge a  model on my own team turn one and have a few marshals follow but masters usually want to go last on turn one. Had I been plsying Sonnia I could probably have started killing with those two ap.  Mid game it might be usable to opportunistically reposition a few marshals. I may have missed something very potent with this ability since I son't play her.

[trikk]

I think if Scales were 2SS they would be ok. Maybe change the TN for friendly  to  +-8.

Puryfing Flame`s biggest issue is that it competes with Malifaux Child which can use Just Like You to Flamewall. If Sonnia had an option to summon him as a (0) it would be nice and he definitely should be 2SS. I also agree with what Ludvig pointed.

 

As for DMs and Justice:

No changes to DMs will make Justice better. Her biggest issue is that she is boring. You spends her turn on movement/swinging her sword and healing from Juggernaut. Her upgrade are pretty situational and mediocre and she lacks a lot of things other similar masters have (for me similar Masters are Mah, Ironsides, Misaki, Pandora). I think while she may compete with single damage output she definitevely lacks in other departments.

[Ludvig]

18 minutes ago, Tris said:

But still, I see it as viable enough to not warrant an errata - I still think that we shouldn`t errata everything just because getting the new information to the players is still ... tedious work at least.

 

And yeah, again, the Proxy is pure garbage, no argument there^^

But at least we actually don`t have the Neverborn/Gremlin problem, where everybody and his mother seems to only take Primordial/Cranky without even thinking if something else would be better/if it fits their playstyle

I wouldn't go so far as to demand errata on the purifying flame, I just find it sort meh compared to the extra flame walls that the malifaux child can give me. That usually has more impact on the game for me.

Som'er, Ophelia and Wong like their own totems I think. My local gremlins seem to swap between those. Both Lilith and Pandora have interesting totems that some players seem to value even over pukey and others don't like them in comparison, they do usually take a totem though. Zoraida can start with pukey and summon her totem but some prefer to start with her own/none. Ten thunders has an interesting totem that rivals Luna in their McCabe crews but there isn't an obvious pick so players develop a preference (but usually use a totem).

I have never seen a guild player leverage any use out of the proxy so guild masters either have a good totem of their own or just go totemless (apart from Sonnia). With the changes to Lucius he might actually get to use the child since it can now copy his main action and it was lowered in Tn. If the child is allowed to declare triggers I can definetly see myself using it in future games!

[4thstringer]

So what mimics will this buff open up for lucius?   Does the+ cast  open up beckoners?  I like the idea of pairing with nurse hb and a few changelings and depending on the + flips to casts to help get the tomes hb uses to immobilize models, or to get the high flip that lets you cheat a tome in. 

Will this lead to a resurgence for graves,  Tannen,  or candy.  Or will doppel, changeling and the tc warrior remain kings of the mimics? 

[4thstringer]

54 minutes ago, Ludvig said:

I wouldn't go so far as to demand errata on the purifying flame, I just find it sort meh compared to the extra flame walls that the malifaux child can give me. That usually has more impact on the game for me.

Som'er, Ophelia and Wong like their own totems I think. My local gremlins seem to swap between those. Both Lilith and Pandora have interesting totems that some players seem to value even over pukey and others don't like them in comparison, they do usually take a totem though. Zoraida can start with pukey and summon her totem but some prefer to start with her own/none. Ten thunders has an interesting totem that rivals Luna in their McCabe crews but there isn't an obvious pick so players develop a preference (but usually use a totem).

I have never seen a guild player leverage any use out of the proxy so guild masters either have a good totem of their own or just go totemless (apart from Sonnia). With the changes to Lucius he might actually get to use the child since it can now copy his main action and it was lowered in Tn. If the child is allowed to declare triggers I can definetly see myself using it in future games!

The only use I've ever heard for GP is the obey into the wp save for death,  but even that is super card intensive.  But man what a trick if you can pull it off.   

[Ludvig]

33 minutes ago, 4thstringer said:

So what mimics will this buff open up for lucius?   Does the+ cast  open up beckoners?  I like the idea of pairing with nurse hb and a few changelings and depending on the + flips to casts to help get the tomes hb uses to immobilize models, or to get the high flip that lets you cheat a tome in. 

Will this lead to a resurgence for graves,  Tannen,  or candy.  Or will doppel, changeling and the tc warrior remain kings of the mimics? 

It's only  attacks and horror but he now buffs in a 6" aura and all mimics and guardsmen in addition to minions so Graves is definetly an option. The dopple will also be really scary if it steals claw attacks. Dashel might also pack a bit more omph Since his ml attack is fairly ok with a . Candy should be able to at least draw some decent cards even if 5 is still a lowish stat. Lucius can also scare snyone (including himself) so you can position Candy, Tannen and others to get the most out of auras and still keep manipulative up. Beckoners still don't look too hot to me.

I guess you could fit in a bunch of the little ones that steal attacks and do a lure into them to trigger a bunch of ml4 attacks with plus flips which should atleast draw out some cards to set up for other stuff. Would probably still prefer a showgirl over a beckoner for that.

[JDAntoine]

1 hour ago, Ludvig said:

@JDAntoine

Justice gives marshals a charge push towards the model that she charged. I believe that is her entire interaction with the marshal subtype. If you have more than about two marshals they will collide and not get very far so it isn't exactly a super ability. Two master ap to move two-three other models up about one ap's worth, that's less impressive than current Lucius   I could use it to charge a  model on my own team turn one and have a few marshals follow but masters usually want to go last on turn one. Had I been plsying Sonnia I could probably have started killing with those two ap.  Mid game it might be usable to opportunistically reposition a few marshals. I may have missed something very potent with this ability since I son't play her.

There is Flames of the Pit aswell. Where I agree with you is that currently 2 Death Marshals will collide and this in turn posses a problem, a problem that is slightly migated by the suggestion of the rng 2 for the Pine Box, hence the suggestion  .
What we see case in point is that Guild Marshals per definition arn't exciting enough to invest into these types of upgrades. It's not that the upgrades are bad per definition. 

If I had the chance to alter Lady Justice it wouldn't be with a brand new Upgrade for her mind you, I'd simply redo Vendetta.

Going from:
VENDETTA
2SS
Lady Justice gains the following Triggers to her
Greatsowrd Attack Action: etc. 

To:
VENDETTA
2SS
Sight Beyond The Veil: When this model
declares an Attack, it may discard a card. If
it does, it may target buried models with the
Attack regardless of range or LoS.

Lady Justice gains the following Triggers to her
Greatsword Attack Action: etc.

But I have no doubt that Lady Justice will be revisited during a later period. I hope the Death Marshal will be revisted to. 

Cheers,

[trikk]

19 minutes ago, JDAntoine said:

 It's not that the upgrades are bad per definition. 

Yes, they are. Vendetta is limited and 2SS. Last Stand is ok. Implacable is pretty weak. Justice Unleashed is very situational. Flames of the pit is way too expensive and works only on Death Marshals. Unrelenting Leader i sok as an up but it should be 1SS and one of the abilities should be on Judges card.

[JDAntoine]

2 minutes ago, trikk said:

Yes, they are. Vendetta is limited and 2SS. Last Stand is ok. Implacable is pretty weak. Justice Unleashed is very situational. Flames of the pit is way too expensive and works only on Death Marshals. Unrelenting Leader i sok as an up but it should be 1SS and one of the abilities should be on Judges card.

It's not from a gamewide perspective that general 1SS or 2SS Upgrades are too expensive.

Upgrades that buff other models are per definition valued by the other models they should be improving aswell. Lady Justice and Death Marshal Recruiter are allright targets and I cannot say that of other Guild Marshals because many of them feel outdated and some of them have just lost a big part of their utility. 

[LunarSol]

A lot of the sense that we have bad totems comes from Wave 1, where... yeah, Scales, Flame (just too expensive), and (shudder) Proxy were all very underwhelming.  I'd put the Chihuahua on the miss pile as well, though not because he's bad, but because he doesn't gel with Guild McMourning the way he does for Ressers.  At least his cost makes him a good cheap activation.  

Lady J's problem is that she's just too limited to be a master.  All she really does is melee damage and her ability to affect the board is very limited in scope accordingly.  She needs a mix of a few more tricks and an easing up on the restrictions of some things like her condition removal and the like similar to what we saw with Lucius.  Most of all though, every upgrade in her box is a mess in need of some work.  It's easy to say that she's boring, but that's the real problem; she's really not master level effective simply because she's quite limited in what she can actually accomplish.

[Ludvig]

1 hour ago, JDAntoine said:

It's not from a gamewide perspective that general 1SS or 2SS Upgrades are too expensive.

Upgrades that buff other models are per definition valued by the other models they should be improving aswell. Lady Justice and Death Marshal Recruiter are allright targets and I cannot say that of other Guild Marshals because many of them feel outdated and some of them have just lost a big part of their utility. 

But flames of the pit doesn't buff guild marshals but only specifically Death Marshals (as in that model). Compare that buff to Nico's Necrotic king that gives every undead model within  8 a  to both Ca actions and All Damage Flips... That is a lot stronger... It's hardly even comparable. That's like having five Papa Loco's in boxes or something. It's not even minions, that's like giving a guild model an upgrade that gave everyone who was living / every construct a plus to their attacks and all damage flips...

[Ludvig]

2 hours ago, JDAntoine said:

There is Flames of the Pit aswell. Where I agree with you is that currently 2 Death Marshals will collide and this in turn posses a problem, a problem that is slightly migated by the suggestion of the rng 2 for the Pine Box, hence the suggestion  .

How would extra ml range help? You would still push towards the model and clonk together ineffectively.  

[JDAntoine]

@Ludvig a buff is a buff and yes multiples help here. You dont clonk together in logical set ups, a push is a push and all that remains clear is that several Guild Marshals are underwhelming.

[Gnomezilla]

19 hours ago, Ludvig said:

I'm also curious on what you meant by guild having other ways to bury stuff if you weren't talking about the emissary.

Sidetrack not 100% errata related but a fun one: Right now I'm trying to figure out if the emissary could actually do some nice trick to just deliver Loco at a scheme marker. That lead me to ponder how many models Lucius could reposition with changelings copying Back in the box Sorry if I'm slow on the uptake, I'm not sure I've seen/thought about that combo properly.

Pine Box ('til next activation, unbury base-to-base), Back in the Box ('til end of turn, unbury at scheme marker), Glimpse the Void ('til end of turn, limit 1 (?), unbury base-to-base).

Since you talk about repositioning with it, I assume you mean friendly burys of the end-of-turn type. I want to see the face of the opponent who suddenly has his target pool halved or more. Bonus points if he's now facing a field of pure mimics with a red-taped strike force. My shenanigans would come from copying Pine Box, though. Been working on ways to get positives to those willpower flips which would keep enemies boxed...

8 hours ago, Ludvig said:

Pineboxes and their range make sense to me since they've been that way for a long time. From a fluff perspective it could be considered unwieldy to put someone in a box compared to poking them with a greatsword but it could easily be explained with them being magical.

I could never wrap my head around the coffin being swung around like a baseball bat, fluff be damned. To me the coffin is always tied to the death marshal's body by its carrying cradle and the marshal, if anything, hurls himself at the target for a body-slam and then the magic works upon contact. That explains the range in the fluff. But nonetheless, like everyone else, I can't internalize that this means Pine Box has a range of 1 (and the nurse's Syringe has a range of 2, that's the other counter-intuitive one: the dual-wielding nurse must have one hell of a reach).

6 hours ago, Tris said:

Actually, I´m probably ok with the Death Marshals as they are (although I´m not against any buffs :p) but would like to see a usable Governors Proxy

I mean, it would even make sense lore wise, as a new Governor means a new proxy, am I right?

And Marlow for sure doesn`t want to be represented by that useless bald guy...

 

Just to break up your discussion a little bit^^

Yeah. Quill pens and old-fashioned robes don't fit Marlow's aesthetic. I'm thinking sharp uniform, air of authority...

5 hours ago, Ludvig said:

That totem is a total trainwreck. The thing I use it for is to proxy the scribe since I have metal Lucius.

Now there's an idea! I'm in the same situation: metal Lucius, metal proxy, no proxy card, yes scribe card. For awhile I wanted to try to make it into a Puppet Wars style Brutal Emissary, but to be honest any skull helm I envisioned just made him look like a Pokémon.

5 hours ago, JDAntoine said:

Thanks to the Death Marshal Recruiter you are capable of gaining a massive survivability boost to Lady Justice, this is great. In order to make the most use out of it however you'll also want to include more Guild Marshal's, such as The Judge or a Death Marshal.

I'm not sure that's the case actually. Abuela works well enough in non-Family crews by making a single model Family and working in tandem with it, and she doesn't even need to discard cards from a limited hand to power her keyword ability. The recruiter, I think, won't want to extend pseudo HtK onto more than two models.

For the sake of hilarity, and keeping the cussed things alive, that model working in tandem with the recruiter might be a totem. I can think of two which die far faster than I'd like them to (unless Frame for Murder is in the pool).

[Ludvig]

10 minutes ago, Gnomezilla said:

Pine Box ('til next activation, unbury base-to-base), Back in the Box ('til end of turn, unbury at scheme marker), Glimpse the Void ('til end of turn, limit 1 (?), unbury base-to-base).

Since you talk about repositioning with it, I assume you mean friendly burys of the end-of-turn type. I want to see the face of the opponent who suddenly has his target pool halved or more. Bonus points if he's now facing a field of pure mimics with a red-taped strike force. My shenanigans would come from copying Pine Box, though. Been working on ways to get positives to those willpower flips which would keep enemies boxed...

 

Actually, Back in the box buries the target until the end of the Emmissary's next activation, not the end of any turn. That means that you can make things pop out the same turn if you make it happen outside of activation. It also means they always get to activate on the turn they pop out so it's less useful for denying enemy activations. Lucius could use a couple of changelings who copy back in the box via his command and then take their activations to spew out unactivated big threats more or less anywhere. The trick would be to get scheme markers far up, both hidden sniper and an austringer could do that.

[Ludvig]

@Gnomezilla As a Hoffman player you should enjoy the emmissary more than most actually. It can get modifications from Hoffman to get a ram to all it's attacks. You can then use machine puppet to bury Howard Langston. You then make the emmissary fast and have it attack someone, now autocamtically decapitating on every hit. You also end that nightmare by popping Langston out at a conveniently placed scheme marker  

The trick to burying own models is to do the buying before the emmissary activates. Hoffman, Perdita and Abuela could do that, now Lucius can do it too.

[Tris]

1 hour ago, Ludvig said:

Actually, Back in the box buries the target until the end of the Emmissary's next activation, not the end of any turn. That means that you can make things pop out the same turn if you make it happen outside of activation. It also means they always get to activate on the turn they pop out so it's less useful for denying enemy activations.

That depends entirely on when you use it - outside of activation on your own stuff - great to keep it safe, pop it out, activate, self heal if the emissary put his aura up.

 

If you manage to bury an enemy model before they activate (during your activation) they are essentialy out of the game for at least a whole turn, maybe even more (also dependant on where you let them out again - I love myself a fast dog or watcher to get a scheme marke in a bad position, or the enemies markers back in their deployment zone )

[Ludvig]

44 minutes ago, Tris said:

That depends entirely on when you use it - outside of activation on your own stuff - great to keep it safe, pop it out, activate, self heal if the emissary put his aura up.

 

If you manage to bury an enemy model before they activate (during your activation) they are essentialy out of the game for at least a whole turn, maybe even more (also dependant on where you let them out again - I love myself a fast dog or watcher to get a scheme marke in a bad position, or the enemies markers back in their deployment zone )

Yeah, it can be used to great effect and if you have convenient scheme markers somewhere in the middle of nowhere you can more or less get them out of the game. Just make sure they didn't want to be in your deployment zone due to schemes or want to remove your scheme markers in their zone.    I was sort of in pinebox mode still where you can keep a model there for the rest of the game with the right cards, compared to that an activation isn't as impressive.