Crew building

[Joachim]

Hello guys,

I'm playing a game in about two weeks and both players declared neverborn. I currently own Zoraida and Titania cause of aesthetic reasons and I also like to play at least partially thematic crews. 

That said, I'm wondering what you guys consider the best choice of crew given the models I have, neverborn opponent and schemes and strat. Alternatively if you think I really miss a certain category of model or a model in specific pls tell me and it might influence my purchase plans.

 

I own the following models:

- Zoraida crew box

- Titania crew box

- McTavish

- Bayou gators

- Waldgeist (proxy, getting them anyway in the near future)

- Rougarou

- Mysterious emissary

- Changelings

- Wisps

 

This is the scheme pool:

strat: Collect the bounty

schemes:

- claim jump

- eliminate the leadership

- frame for murder

- leave your mark

- hunting party

 

Greetings, Joachim.

[Ergonomic Cat]

That's a highly killy scheme pool, so you're probably going to want to kill and not die.  However, you have only McTavish as an Enforcer that can do murdering.  So I think you're best off denying kills and removing their ability to kill.

I'd pick FFM and Claim Jump, and bring Titania with Audience with the Queen, Behold my Glory and Aether Connection.  Then Tooth and Thorn and a Rougarou to make a central bundle of death - the Knights pull targets in, the Rougarou jumps on them and murders.  Tooth can trigger a lot of pushes for the Rougarou, and the scheme markers they drop help keep the wolf alive.  Titania keeps the focus on herself as well.  Then I'd toss in either McTavish and a Changeling for ranged murder and a Waldgeist to stay alive, or another Rougarou and two Waldgeists.  Titania and the Knights are gonna drop plenty of scheme markers to score claim jump and let McTavish move around on their own.

[feagaur]

This may be personal preference, but I would go with Zoraida and probably go with McT, Rogarou, The Tooth, a couple of gators and some changelings.

The tooth and rogarou will be pulling things in and doing some killing whilst McT and the changelings will be killing from distance.

I'd be half tempted as well to drop the changelings to begin with and take the emissary for the land markers and trying to pump out changelings that way. Its unlikely that you are going to be doing too much shooting in the first turn or so.

Zoraida will be obeying things to get more shots off, or getting out the doll to paralyze the opposition. The gators can start from the shadows and just start chomping things.

[Joachim]

Thanks for the feedback so far.

I'm personally preferring zoraida as it is easier for her to stay safe as eliminate the leader is in the pool. Titania can be tanky but if the opponent really wants her down she can die quickly cause df5, especially against high minimum damage (I'm talking about you, teddy).

My best bet of doing the killing is mctavish and some changelings around him + zoraida obey can pump out a good amount of accurate shots which should work well against neverborn.

I think bad juju will not be a good pick cause he's a henchman and worth a lot of points for the opponent + giving away points for frame for murder.

 

I do like the emissary a lot and he has done a lot of work so far in the games that I brought him in. I also like the conflux for zoraida as you can manipulate your deck a bit, which can be nice to scout the black joker and make it easier to not hit in on a horror duel for an important model (mctavish, zoraida). And as you said in stead of hiring the changelings the emissary can try and summon some to copy mctavish.

I absolutely loved the rougarou + tooth module in my last titania game so I will consider it. They're not supertanky but it will be an additional threat apart from mctavish and offers some synergy with the semi-pounce from the changelings. And additional benefit is that they're just minions for collect the bounty and tooth is still relatively hard to kill for its points. 

Now the question is how to fit everything in. I like to think in modules and fit them in order to do what i want to do, for example mctavish + waldgeist/gators upfield + changelings/emissary or rougarou + tooth, zoraida + 2 wisps (+voodoo doll) and then give myself a budget for upgrades + stones. I feel that that is a good way to start building a crew that is focussed on accomplishing the strat and schemes you have in mind.

 

@feagaur I read you have some experience with zoraida. I bought the bayou gators for aesthetics with mctavish. And I have used them before with mctavish and have some obvious synergies with him. Especially the hexed among you upgrade really helps them and waldgeists out. But how you see them compared to other options? Now you have the wisps for 3ss, you have changelings for 4ss, a waldgeist for 6ss and if you're willing to spend some more an autumn knight for 7ss. I find them limited by ml5 and being very squishy. A (0) push and melee expert can surprise a lot of people though as they don't expect that from a 5ss minion :). In specific how do they compare to waldgeists which I see as pretty direct competition, being only 1ss more expensive, being swampfiends, but being a lot tankier. 

I'm trying to get better with zoraida but up till now I always had the problem of having so many options with Zoraida that I sometimes have trouble focussing on certain objectives.

[feagaur]

I don't think I'd bother with the wisps. They might help bring things towards our crew with wisps call. But I don't think I'd use them for getting the voodoo doll out. Killing things through conditions won't give you the credit for the kill for either Hunting Party or Collect the bounty.

As to the gators, I'd say that as you're up against neverborn you're more likely going to be looking at glass cannons so I'd take the gators who can get more hits and hopefully do more damage. Stick Frame on one of them too so you can almost guarantee getting some points. Waldergiests might be good for FFM too but they wont be doing much killing, just slowing people down. And all you need is retributions eye on something (which it will be) and they'll go down quickly.

For the tooth and the Rogarou, I'd stick them behind a hungry land marker. That way anything wanting to get to them will have to take damage, hopefully making it easier for you to finish them off. The only thing to watch out for with the land markers is that any models that are killed by them won't give any points for the strat or schemes. (but that works both ways).

Remember too that the pseudo pounce works for and model that walks into the range the attack they have can be taken. So that kinda gives them a 14" pounce from McT's gun.

[Voodoo Specter]

Personally I love Zoraida when frame for murder is in the pool as if you can figure out who their frame target is you can condition kill them fairly easily and you can obey enemy Henchmen to kill your target making it easier to score. The whisp has a few disadvantages but overall I think its a taker firstly as Feagaur said the doll won't count for kills towards collect the bounty and If your opponent can get hold of the wisp they will kill it fairly easil scoring for kill the bounty and possibly hunting party. You also lack models that make the voodoo doll great like iggy or a nurse. That said getting the doll out cheaply is still a good option if you use it to target big hitters and take chunks out of them so your other minions can finish them off or as mentioned earlier deny frame for murder.

They are incoporeal and can hide easily to deny hunting party if you only take a couple of minions although they are a cheap activation but most importantly they can prevent your opponent from charging leaving his models stranded in front of your gun line if you go the McTavish + Changling option or just leaving them open to counter attack if you don't.

 

[Joachim]

About the wisp:

it's a 3ss cheap activation so that's always good. As said you can easily try and hide it to deny hunting party. If you kill through the voodoo doll it won't count for the strat but that also goes for the voodoo doll itself. Don't forget that zoraida gets plus flips against the hem target which can be pretty nice if you want to bewitch/obey some big beater. Situationally you can also interact with the doll to make something move (hello hazardous terrain). It can move into a terrifying model and get paralyzed. You can also hurt it with the emissary and give it the condition that zoraida can obey without los and with a + flip. So there's still plenty the voodoo doll can do in stead of killing.

Apart from that, if you can target a key model to the opponent or a big threat such as teddy and the voodoo doll helps in disposing of it quickly then that can definitely be very nice, maybe you'll give up a point for the strat on that turn but removing such a model can give you the advantage in the next turn.

So all by all I will stil try out the wisp, also cause I just got them and I'm painting them up. 

 

I'm also a big fan of McTavish, he's always done great. Also shooting will be handy vs low defense neverborn models. I do like the idea of changelings beside him to give some extra low Sh shots. But I prefer to hire the emissary and try and summon them instead. Which is off course already a hefty investment. I'll see what I can fit in around that. Probably some swampfiend minions to put in front of mctavish.

 

[Vorschlag]

I don't have my books with me and have banned myself using Zoraida to force myself out of my comfort zone.

So I'm not certain this is legal but I believe wisps can also fickle winds of fate on scheme markers to score or deny claim jump or raven form towards leave your mark.

I may be off the mark as I've only used Zoraida once with wisps and attempted the doll spam.

[Ergonomic Cat]

9 minutes ago, Vorschlag said:

I don't have my books with me and have banned myself using Zoraida to force myself out of my comfort zone.

So I'm not certain this is legal but I believe wisps can also fickle winds of fate on scheme markers to score or deny claim jump or raven form towards leave your mark.

I may be off the mark as I've only used Zoraida once with wisps and attempted the doll spam.

Animal Shape is fine, because it doesn't mention Zoraida.  It's a *very* nice thing to do.  You can send Zoraida and the Wisps out 15" each, which threatens a lot of space.

Fickle Winds of Fate is also "this model" so should work just fine since the Wisps can pull from upgrade cards too.

[Joachim]

Indeed, so yeah there's a lot of use you get out of a 3ss minion. Just the fact that he can copy a 2 ap master action is pretty amazing, even if you don't want to do murdering with the doll.

 

[feagaur]

I've experimented a bit with what the wisps can do with Zoraida and found that copying animal shape only usually leads to bad things. Unless you just cast 'wisps call' on a model and then animal shape 15" towards your table edge.

For Fickle winds, you're only really going to use this to deny certain schemes and it would require the wisps being close to the markers. Which generally means theyre going to be close to your opponents models that placed the markers. So again, this will either require lots of setup or luck to get to the ideal situation.

Then again, moving just 1 scheme marker can be a killer for some schemes.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that although wisps are only 3ss, I really want them to be doing something each turn that adds to the crew. Having one in there on the off chance it might be able to deny schemes by moving some markers as a last activation is a bit too much of a gamble. If I had the stones spare I may take one. If I'm running a doll/teddy factory or a gupp spawning list I'll take 2. Otherwise theres usually something better to take. I mean, gupps are only 1ss more.

[Joachim]

That is true but they can get a doll out each turn, and even if you just hem an important model, zoraida gets plus flips and can go to town with bewitch and obey on that model. And that is something you can easily do each turn. And that is considering you're not using the doll for anything else. And even then the doll gives you an extra activation.

I will definitely try one since i just got the models. I agree that bringing 2 is situational. I'm also not convinced of copying animal shape and the scheme marker manipulation is highly situational but that's just gravy for me. If you can move markers with them and deny a scheme late game that's huge. If they don't get the chance you just put out a voodoo doll.

[Ergonomic Cat]

5 hours ago, Joachim said:

That is true but they can get a doll out each turn, and even if you just hem an important model, zoraida gets plus flips and can go to town with bewitch and obey on that model. And that is something you can easily do each turn. And that is considering you're not using the doll for anything else. And even then the doll gives you an extra activation.

I will definitely try one since i just got the models. I agree that bringing 2 is situational. I'm also not convinced of copying animal shape and the scheme marker manipulation is highly situational but that's just gravy for me. If you can move markers with them and deny a scheme late game that's huge. If they don't get the chance you just put out a voodoo doll.

If you're playing something like Interference, it's basically a constant threat on your opponent.  Generally, I think you use it for the first few turns to make the Voodoo Doll, then on turn 3 or 4, you jump 15", then walk, and create a threat (or just create a model that will always be counting).  

I agree a Gupps is only 1ss more.

However, if you're playing Zoraida, I look at the Wisp as a virtual Voodoo Doll - any crew that would hire a Voodoo Doll, rather than summon turn 1, it's a straight swap.  If you wouldn't hire a Voodoo Doll, then I look at the Wisp as a 3ss upgrade that says "You may discard this upgrade to give you Master Super Fast (Gain 2 AP this turn)."   

[Vorschlag]

Going to have to get round to that doll spam list with widow weaver fueled by the torn and tattered remains of voodoo dolls duel summoned in each turn....eventually attempting it with Vasilisa.

Damn I miss running Zoraida.

[Ergonomic Cat]

9 hours ago, Vorschlag said:

Going to have to get round to that doll spam list with widow weaver fueled by the torn and tattered remains of voodoo dolls duel summoned in each turn....eventually attempting it with Vasilisa.

Damn I miss running Zoraida.

Stay strong!  Don't go back to her!