How to outplay Imbued Energies ?

[WWHSD]

There's a lot of "OMG, I can't believe this works" in Malifaux. Since there's so much of it I think it's hard to single out something like Myranda+IE as being broken or OP. If something isn't making scheme scoring too trivial (Raptors + PP) or removing too many scoring options from opponents (Wind Gamin not getting killed) and isn't causing a model to do way more damage than they should, I'd prefer to exercise restraint in calling for nerfs.

Myranda + IE just delivers a Cerberus or Blessed a little further up the board than it could get by itself and gives card draw for a single turn. In the grand scheme of things that's not that overwhelming.

[Sklertic]

I think people are overreacting.

The draw is good, but I disagree it's OP. It's an investment from the Arcanist player ( a solid one, no doubt about that), but compared to so many other tricks you can find in this game, this one is rather tame in my opinion.

[Ludvig]

Yeah, this is so far from the worst alpha strikes or most oppressive tricks in this game. I don't see any need to nerf Myranda.

It's a shame she so rarely gets to spend time in her own skin though.

[Rillan]

Just now, Ludvig said:

Yeah, this is so far from the worst alpha strikes or most oppressive tricks in this game. I don't see any need to nerf Myranda.

Where did u read someone is asking to nerf Myranda ? The upgrade is unbalanced.

1 hour ago, Sklertic said:

It's an investment from the Arcanist player

There is a huge difference on how it work with different models... On every other model it looks Ok. But with Myrandas shapeshifting for 1 SS this upgrade does miracles and give a very powerful hand. Don't tell me stories that players cant get good cards when their hand consists of 10 cards +2 via SS use and where even low value Books are useful for Marcus. After Myranda uses her shapeshifting its 2 turns power play to Marcus player.

 

There is no other Master or Henchman in Acranist faction that can benefit so hard from a 1 SS upgrade.

[Ludvig]

Compare imbued energies to debt that gived you a card and extrs damage. That becomes an awful lot of damage on models with extra ap. In addition they get the soulstone back as well as keeping the upgrade stuck on so you still score show of force and get the promises buff.

Recalled training i TT also give such an obscene buff to both offense and survivability that it is silly for a single soulstone. It is available to masted in a faction which easily makes them fast too.

Each faction has their power upgrades, those upgrades are better for some models than others.

This has been in the game for years without creating a balance issue and I only ever see her in Marcus crews. If the errata policy was to iron out any unintended wrinkles or weird interacrons I would agree that this should be up for errata. The errata policy seems to be more along the lines of touching as little as possible but maintaining balance between factions and models within factions at the tournament level so this doesn't fit until Imbued Myranda is appearing in every list like practiced production did.

[WWHSD]

54 minutes ago, Rillan said:

There is no other Master or Henchman in Acranist faction that can benefit so hard from a 1 SS upgrade.

Here's a few off the top of my head:

Carlos probably benefits at least as much from Stunt Double.
Any Henchman that takes Warding Runes with Mages around are potentially benefiting much more.
I'd say that Practiced Production gives at least as much advantage to the crew as IE on Myranda does.
Many of Sandeep's upgrades are a bigger benefit than Myranda gets from IE (Sandeep without summons kind of sucks, I usually get more from the + flips from Tutor over the course of a game than drawing 4 cards in a single round is worth).
Veteran Fighter on Ironsides is definitely a bigger game changer than IE on Myranda.

 

The card draw that Sommer gets from dying Gremlins makes IE look pathetic (especially if he has a Banonista around)

The only problem that I see with the Myranda+IE has nothing to do with how a match plays and would still exist even if IE didn't work with Myranda. It shouldn't be better to hire Myranda when an upgrade free Blessed or Cerberus is the model you actually want in your crew. With IE you spend the same but get card draw, without IE you save a soulstone.
 

[dancater]

For me its less than "its OP" and more it feels exploitative and it in effect removes two (or three) models from the crew selection/table.

Its such an obvious interaction, it cannot be stopped and it is reasonably powerful.

But also it means (1) Myranda effectively becomes a Cerberus (or Blessed) delivery model, I'd vastly prefer her to be a legitimate henchman selection but between shapeshift with IE putting it over the top she's effectively a 1-2 turn proxy for another model.  (2) The Cerberus/Blessed is rarely (if ever, I guess you may take two) taken as an actual table model Myranda + IE is simply better by nearly every metric than a Cerberus or a Cerberus +upgrade (likely IE).  This simply feels like a terrible waste of a great henchman and also an example of model imbalance (or cost imbalance).  

And in these cases its IE which is the key culprit, it gives Myranda's shapeshift enough of a boost that it stops becoming a powerful ability and morphs into an auto-select whenever those particular models are contemplated for a crew.  

It is not even as if it relies on some clever play, or a interesting combination.  Its a a-b-c opening round (or perhaps turn 2) morph process.  I mean why does Myranda even exist as a model...

• Cerberus upgrade (0) clean fur before the hunt - the Cerberus crew draws cards equal to 5 less the turn number discard after use

It would save a lot of folks having to buy and paint Myranda and I think would make a lot of opponents less upset.

So OP, probably at best borderline, but a auto-take, negative play experience - yeah I think that is closer to the mark.  And by auto-take I mean whenever the Cerberus or Blessed is contemplated.  I play Rasputina and I never ever take the Blessed in a crew, but Myranda and Raspy are like best friends, Myr frequently hangs out with Raspy for a good 5 minutes whenever she thinks trouble is coming.  It feels like that should not be - I both want to use the Myranda model more (in herself) and take her less (in any Arcanist crew with a Blessed or Cerberus) but why would I?

[Ludvig]

@dancater

I don't agree. I faced two cerberuses and Myranda in one game and a list with a cerberus and Myranda. Both in the same international tournament but different players so I wouldn't say they never get taken. I have also faced opponents who prefer to have the Cerberus move up itself turn one and then use the fast turn two to get to charge, leap to another target and then hit it and cheat the tomes they kept from turn one so they trigger a couple of extra attacks on the second target so I have frequently seen lists with them starting in them (usually with Myranda as well).

 

If we want Myranda on the table we could make the shift into a (2) action. Just changing IE would just mean she was taken as a discount for a cerberus anyway but without the upgrade, there would still be very little incentive to keep her around.

[dancater]

Maybe

My base point is not that you never see Cerberus as a table take, its that it has to be more than one for a base Cerberus to be an option, and that is largely because Myranda is Rare 1.  And you hardly ever see Myranda past turn 2 in a game, she'd have to be the rarest henchman in terms of game time from turn 3 onwards in Arcanists if not all Malifaux.  

But I think Myranda compared to a Cerberus +IE has been a tough question for me at times, is the +2SS saved worth fast/4 cards, I may be unique but that is a choice for me.

However, Myranda +IE is better than a Cerberus (as demonstrated by the fact that she is also included, your games were multi-Cerberus) and I also think better than a Cerberus +IE itself.  In short I think IE on Myranda is a upgrade worth more than its +1SS, the equivalent of 4 cards (over 2 turns so it is different) extra draw is 2SS.

As for making shapeshift a (2) action the problem here is that would simply mean no one takes Myranda.  Without shapeshift she is at best an average niche henchman, and as a (2) action she is not much better, she'd still, in fact more likely only see the table as a shift +IE but you would not get the movement.  It would not be worth taking her normal as her shift would be so expensive and you may not get it and the other things she does (without factoring in shift) means she'd make way for the other great henchman in Arcanists.

If shift became (2) you'd need to improve her base significantly.  Which I think would be an interesting avenue, particularly if you gave her a unique skill set to other Arcanist henchman and I'd also increase her Beast/Marcus/Poison synergy - if she had some form of expunge, wow, or a make poison ticks heal would be an interesting trick (sort of like Kaeris).  I'd like a movement trick where she could exchange places with any friendly Beast (non-peon, to exclude more Raptor issues) on the field say to a range of 12' or 18' (call it something like Shadowshift), so you have a Cerberus or Moleman or whatever and (Blade & Claw style) the switch with Myranda.

But the problem here is you get out of simple tweak errata and move into we need a careful playtest re-work (so its more a future edition [3E] idea really).

I think simply reducing/changing the Myranda +IE interaction is by far the simplest short-term won't break the game re-work, reducing the Myranda shift benefit just enough that (1) opponents don't always cry (even if they are overly dramatic) (2) she might see a little of her own table time and (3) it might make the straight single Cerberus choice more tempting (because now Cerberus +IE is a shade better potentially).

Its a patch, but its a simple one which does not hugely impact our power curve and will reduce a notable source of opponents "Arcanist broken here" complaints.  Not ideal, but then it can't be in this limited context anyway. 

[KingCrow]

Myranda herself is built to be a tanky support model so she isn't used for damage.  But what if her Hunting Call ability had a built in Mask or, better yet, what if the ability was able to target enemy Beast models (with a resist of course)?  I think she would see more table time.  I know I would personally love to have another model on the board that could use the enemies abilities against them as Marcus uses his Alpha ability.  It still requires set-up to turn the enemy into a Beast and a Ca 6 with needing a Mask would be still be a decent restriction.  I think this would be a great reason to keep Myranda on the board and you wouldn't see her shapechanging into a Beast turn 1 or 2.  Keeping Shapechange as a 0 action is still an option but then you have to decide if trading Myranda's tankiness/heals/Hunting Call is worth getting a different model.  Hell, even if she was bumped to 9 or 10 stones for this ability, I would still consider taking her if her HC was usable on enemy Beasts.  

But just for the record, I still don't consider her Shapechange with IE to be "broken" or OP.  It's a combo that compares with Tara's Beast Bomb of burying a big hitter and it popping up to kill something.  There's nothing you can do vs it but that's how it works.  You just have to tank it and work around it because that is how it works. 

[Ludvig]

@dancater

The chages you suggested wouldn't need more playtesting than the Lucius changes which affected a bunch of models so I would say it is within the scope of a normal errata.

She is far from the rarest seen henchman. Bad Juju, Spawn mother, Wrath, Aeslin, Taelor, Sidir, Sam Hopkins, Ototo and Yamaziko are pretty rarely seen in my experience. Myranda is at least there for a turn. That being said that shouldn't be an argument for making her useless.

If she shows up in Marcus crews I think that is a good thing, they are mates a after all. If the cerberus gets tskrn too rarely I think removing shapechange from her entirely and dropping her a stone would solve that. Then she would be a dedicated buffer with very respectable defenses and an ok attack but she wouldn't be edging out the other beasts but have a clearly defined role of her own.

[Adran]

9 hours ago, dancater said:

My base point is not that you never see Cerberus as a table take, its that it has to be more than one for a base Cerberus to be an option, and that is largely because Myranda is Rare 1.  And you hardly ever see Myranda past turn 2 in a game, she'd have to be the rarest henchman in terms of game time from turn 3 onwards in Arcanists if not all Malifaux.  

But I think Myranda compared to a Cerberus +IE has been a tough question for me at times, is the +2SS saved worth fast/4 cards, I may be unique but that is a choice for me.

However, Myranda +IE is better than a Cerberus (as demonstrated by the fact that she is also included, your games were multi-Cerberus) and I also think better than a Cerberus +IE itself.  In short I think IE on Myranda is a upgrade worth more than its +1SS, the equivalent of 4 cards (over 2 turns so it is different) extra draw is 2SS.

A

I see loads of Cerberus Table time, and very little Myranda in starting lists. And when I have a Myranda on the table she typically lasts till turn 3 or 4. 

But as I said, I value the fast much higher than those 4 cards for allowing me more options in uninterrupted threat range, and I select Myranda for 2 reasons, firstly, because I want to use Myranda, either as the high Df model that makes all beasts near much more survivable or the Henchman that makes Venomancy better, or because I'm playing a pool event, and selecting her hasn't restricted my options as much. I think she sort of suffers from the same issue as Dashel, in that her best abilities are passive, so her activation's don't seem that impressive on their own (and Shapeshift isn't passive, but it's not something that makes her activation seem good, but rather the turn). 

Whilst I am not sure that any errata is needed, I wouldn't object to the cards being removed from her shapechange. I also wouldn't object to less suits needed for her abilities. And some way that you could actually use the Skin walker upgrade. 

 

 

[dancater]

1 hour ago, Ludvig said:

@dancater

The chages you suggested wouldn't need more playtesting than the Lucius changes which affected a bunch of models so I would say it is within the scope of a normal errata.

She is far from the rarest seen henchman. Bad Juju, Spawn mother, Wrath, Aeslin, Taelor, Sidir, Sam Hopkins, Ototo and Yamaziko are pretty rarely seen in my experience. Myranda is at least there for a turn. That being said that shouldn't be an argument for making her useless.

If she shows up in Marcus crews I think that is a good thing, they are mates a after all. If the cerberus gets tskrn too rarely I think removing shapechange from her entirely and dropping her a stone would solve that. Then she would be a dedicated buffer with very respectable defenses and an ok attack but she wouldn't be edging out the other beasts but have a clearly defined role of her own.

Agreed here.

And as for Adran, yeah I imagine in some metas and with some players Myranda gets playing time but a lot of folks seem to bug on the Myranda +IE.  I rarely take Marcus and am the main Arcanist player in my area, I tend to take Myranda +IP for Df8 because it makes her fun and difficult to handle and don't shapeshift at all, but I think I'm a minority and I don't ever really play competitively.

I agree my changes are probably less than Lucius but I imagine (or hope) they had solid play testing.  Anyway somehow we've got away from this posts original topic and into a fruitless discussion on model strengths.  Enough said that I think you can handle Myranda +IE best if you don't let that ability disrupt your game in greater proportion than it actually demands. 

[Rillan]

5 hours ago, dancater said:

I think I'm a minority and I don't ever really play competitively.

Thats the answer ; P  In my community everyone plays for win and builds crews for win. And we have a Marcus player with must have Myranda + IE pick. Its not unbeatable but it changed the way we play.

[skoatz]

1 hour ago, Rillan said:

 Its not unbeatable but it changed the way we play.

Are you expecting to not have to change the way you play in order to counter strong combos/synergies in your opponent's crew?  And that's an honest question.  I'm not trying to be sarcastic or anything like that.  I'm just confused at what you're discussing at this point.  If Myranda + IE is not unbeatable, but it requires you to adapt, is that a bad thing?  Isn't the ability to adapt and counter your opponent's plans a show of skill in Malifaux?

I definitely recognize that there have been combos/interactions in Malifaux that are just too strong or just terrible to play against.  generally, they get fixed with the erratas/FAQs.  Myranda + IE has been around so long (for over 4 years) and I wouldn't classify it as too strong or terrible to play against.

[Rillan]

11 minutes ago, skoatz said:

Are you expecting to not have to change the way you play in order to counter strong combos/synergies in your opponent's crew?  And that's an honest question.  I'm not trying to be sarcastic or anything like that.  I'm just confused at what you're discussing at this point.  If Myranda + IE is not unbeatable, but it requires you to adapt, is that a bad thing?  Isn't the ability to adapt and counter your opponent's plans a show of skill in Malifaux?

I definitely recognize that there have been combos/interactions in Malifaux that are just too strong or just terrible to play against.  generally, they get fixed with the erratas/FAQs.  Myranda + IE has been around so long and I wouldn't classify it as too strong or terrible to play against.

We will see the upcoming errata. And when one single model changes the way people play it cant be called balance. Its called meta, and meta is when everyone plays around strongest.

[skoatz]

24 minutes ago, Rillan said:

And when one single model changes the way people play it cant be called balance.

A single model changes the way people play in every single game.  I'm playing against Arcanists, so I choose my crew accordingly.  Then my opponent reveals Rasputina.  Well that means I'm probably going to spread out more.  But what if my opponent had revealed a different master?  My crew is still the same, but the way I play against that master is going to be different than the way I play against Rasputina.

One model changing the way you play isn't unbalanced.  Especially because your opponent is also changing the way they play because of the models you chose.  It's not just one single model in the entire game.  Lots of models change the way people play across all crews/factions.  Your opponent has access to strong combos, but so do you.  That's why I feel like it's balanced.  

24 minutes ago, Rillan said:

 Its called meta, and meta is when everyone plays around strongest.

Meta is impossible to avoid.  Every competitive game has a meta.  Hell, even chess has a meta of sorts.  But I don't see how Malifaux having a meta makes the game inherently unbalanced.

 

[KingCrow]

25 minutes ago, Rillan said:

We will see the upcoming errata. And when one single model changes the way people play it cant be called balance. Its called meta, and meta is when everyone plays around strongest.

I see lots of other single models that change the way I play such as Killjoy, Howard Langston, Yin.  I could keep going on with the list because so many models change how I want to play.  Every game forces the players to change the way they are going to play because that's how the game is.  You can NEVER expect to play the game you want to play because you have to act and react according to what your opponent does. 

Perhaps you should try out a hard hitter like the first two I mentioned and see what your opponent thinks of it.  It's not "playing the strongest", it's just playing Malifaux, especially since those two have been around forever.

[Ludvig]

What the others have said, you always need to adapt.

I vastly prefer facing Myranda to facing Imbued Langston with reactivate from the brass arachnid turn 1. Facing Myranda isn't that different from facing the cerberus starting in the game. Myranda is not worse than Burt with debt and fast pushed up by Nellie to do a sickening amount of damage. He is also 7ss.

If you are playing Ramos you should easily out-activate Marcus and have Langston ready to charge the cerberus when Myranda turns into it so you can slaughter it. Large parts of your crew should be durable enough to weather it's attacks as well, just don't play aggressively with the mech rider if you have it in your list. 

[Adran]

17 hours ago, Rillan said:

Thats the answer ; P  In my community everyone plays for win and builds crews for win. And we have a Marcus player with must have Myranda + IE pick. Its not unbeatable but it changed the way we play.

Always picking something  makes life easy for your opponent. I'm not arguing that Myranda and energies is not good, but I honestly believe it is not the strongest (certainly in all situations), so what you actually have is the Marcus player reaching a plateau where they have found something comfortable, and stopped looking for better things. I play competitively, and like to challenege other peoples conceptions as to what is best. 

I have to change what I do against almost every model, and I have to change what I do for every strategy and scheme pool. I loved facing guild when they all thought the only way was to include Frank, because I could hire a plan to deal with him. 

[Bane]

This thread is ridiculous. There's no issue with Myranda; she's an excellent model in her own right. Sacrificing her for 4 cards isn't free, it costs the upgrade and costs a very solid model that brings + Df flips for your glass cannon Marcus crew and a very decent heal.

No one complains that the Cerberus is overpowered, so why is becoming one an issue? It's a 1" engagement model - definitely a significant drawback - and is hardly difficult to drop with df5 and no armor, HTK or HTW.

The Blessed also is overpriced, that's why you don't see it. It's not because Myranda is somehow the issue. 

Does everyone whine about literally ANYTHING that's good in this game? The Arcanist errata thread ideas are a train wreck.

[Ludvig]

7 minutes ago, Bane said:

Does everyone whine about literally ANYTHING that's good in this game? The Arcanist errata thread ideas are a train wreck.

Isn't this thread a single player with a negative experience getting counter arguments from a lot of different people? Periodically somene will start a thread similar to this one about some good model. I'd say the vast majority of threads are about other things.

The errata threads always turn into that kind of thread though, it is sort of encouraged by having such a thread. I'd steer clear of those if you don't like people negging on models. 

[WWHSD]

1 hour ago, Bane said:

The Blessed also is overpriced, that's why you don't see it. It's not because Myranda is somehow the issue. 

If you are spending 9 points on either a Cerberus or Blessed (with no upgrades), why would you ever hire one directly instead of hiring Myranda+IE for the same cost?

The only reason I can think of is that you are playing an encouter that uses Ours as the strategy or that A Quick Murder is in the pool and you aren’t hiring anything that costs more than 8 soulstones.

[Sybarite]

It's that bloody power creep! Oh wait