Third Edition is Coming!!

[Teluriel12]

15 minutes ago, Saduhem said:

...

I, personally, believe there are business decisions behind these choices more than strict adherence to fluff. Someone wanting to play Lynch is going to probably now buy more ten Thunders models, Outcasts are going to purchase Gremlins for zipp, and if you used Coryphee and Mannequins with Collodi you might want to buy Colette and, since you're venturing in Arcanist territory, go ahead and pick up Marcus.

...

 

I think you are right here...in the end Wyrd is a company who wants to sell as much as possible...while i agree streamlining a game is natural evolution and shakeups do happen...the argument of the story and fluff to make these changes is just an excuse to shake things up and hopefully will steer people into buying new shiny things...even shiny things they already had to start with.

Again, its their game and they are a company so in that respect I can understand these business decisions...but they are walking a thin line for at least a portion of their playerbase.

 

[Saduhem]

28 minutes ago, Teluriel12 said:

I think you are right here...in the end Wyrd is a company who wants to sell as much as possible...while i agree streamlining a game is natural evolution and shakeups do happen...the argument of the story and fluff to make these changes is just an excuse to shake things up and hopefully will steer people into buying new shiny things...even shiny things they already had to start with.

Again, its their game and they are a company so in that respect I can understand these business decisions...but they are walking a thin line for at least a portion of their playerbase.

 

Although I do believe there is a strong financial aspect to these decisions, I also respect that the lore was kept in consideration as part of an organic whole. The other thing they could have done was to make all the least used models disproportionately good and have everyone rush to buy them, similar to what another prominent miniature war-game company has done recently.

I think that they are using a model similar to what The Other Side is using. Instead of artificially creating tiers of must buy and obsolete models, they promote lateral hiring across factions based on keywords. This translates, as it is meant to happen with TOS, to people not necessarily having to wait on new models in their faction to be released but instead look at options present in other factions. In TOS this happens through the use of envoys and dual faction commanders. In Malifaux the lateral hiring (and buying) will be promoted by the keyword used by your favorite master. In the end, while absolutely not mandatory, there will be reasons to own all factions if you really want, or a select few models scattered across if you want to focus on a master or two. 

Without promoting cross-faction purchases, I don't see how Malifaux can sustain itself after releasing so many models so far. I cannot conceive of any other possible way to reinvigorate sales but this. Someone in Wyrd's offices really worked hard on this new purchase model. Making it also work within the lore and universe without making it feel cheap must have been an excruciating labor.
 

This does not really make it less painful to see some of our favorite models out of the picture (partially or totally), but our involvement as a community in the Beta could provide ways to cushion the hit. 

The fact that Mason has not disclosed too much as to how much support the DMH masters and totems are going to receive besides having their own sub-category suggests that perhaps not everything is set in stone (at least not every aspect of the matter).

The guy has a reference to the last good Silent Hill game as his forum avatar, he must have SOME sense :}

Edit: TL;DR Still hurts, I would still like official proxy rules, but I can see why things are they way they are and I can't personally propose a better alternative.

[tadaka]

Atm I just want to know if Mccabe is going to be able to use his Nightmare box set. I will miss my Cavalry  I am guessing I will lose access to around 30 models with this change over.

[WWHSD]

4 minutes ago, tadaka said:

Atm I just want to know if Mccabe is going to be able to use his Nightmare box set. I will miss my Cavalry  I am guessing I will lose access to around 30 models with this change over.

Is there any reason that models like the Nightmare crews need to continue to represent the same models in M3E that they did in M2E?

[Phinn]

Mister @Mason, can a model have multiple Keywords?
For example Waldgeists, Silurids, Spawn Mother, Gupps... Are their Keywords going to be Swampfiend (Zoraida) and Beast (Marcus)?

Are some Keyword pools of models going to be much larger than others? For example Beasts versus... well, anything else actually 😃
Not trying to complain or anything, just being sincerely curious 🙂

[ebolazaire]

With regards to Keywords :

 

Was about to pull the trigger on Levi and the Riders before the announcement. 

All I really want to know now is whether there will still be an option to play that list... 

[Parker Barrows]

1 hour ago, Phinn said:

Mister @Mason, can a model have multiple Keywords?
For example Waldgeists, Silurids, Spawn Mother, Gupps... Are their Keywords going to be Swampfiend (Zoraida) and Beast (Marcus)?

Are some Keyword pools of models going to be much larger than others? For example Beasts versus... well, anything else actually 😃
Not trying to complain or anything, just being sincerely curious 🙂

I'm assuming models will be able to have multiple keywords like now.

[admiralvorkraft]

3 hours ago, Saduhem said:

I'm seeing a lot of comments here criticizing the people who are mourning their gone Masters.

As someone who made a post that could be construed as critical of some/all of those complaining about their "lost" masters, allow me to elaborate.

You are allowed to feel however you want. Your feelings are valid. However your feelings don't change the fact that the current game-state makes competitive play basically a joke. The shift towards optimized aggro crews is a natural extension of there being so much crap in the game right now that the only way to reliably deal with it is to just clear the board. It's like if every chess game saw you sitting down across a board and looking at sixteen models that moved in ways you vaguely recognized but didn't really understand. Rather than trying to play for the checkmate you almost have to first set the board to a simple enough state that you can accurately anticipate moves. It defeats the whole way the game is structured.

So to have a competitive Malifaux scene you need a way to limit the variables to some quasi-human manageable number. To do that you need to streamline the game somewhat and introduce a limiting factor on the number of models that players need to be familiar with. The first one is obviously a goal of M3E but the second one is tricky. It's tricky because some people have an emotional investment in their crews - that's to be expected - and it's tricky because Wyrd needs to keep people buying models. The only way to satisfy the first and third priorities (maintaining a competitive scene and profits within the business model) is to impose a rolling limited format. Say 7 masters per faction, 10 henchmen, etc. 

Satisfying the the emotional needs of individuals to see their well loved models on the tabletop means a compromise. I think that a good place to start is updating those masters and other models that have rotated out of "standard" so that they are playable under the active rules-set and are balanced for good casual play - meaning that they aren't rigorously tested in all combinations and scenarios, but that they are put on the table a few times with their theme crew and are reasonably fun for both players.

Now if Wyrd intends to move to a rotating format (and I really hope they do) then I think they need to do so very intentionally, and communicate proactively. This is especially important with the US Masters Tour coming online. That way those of us who are committed wargamers first, last, and always have a continually balanced and supported game that we can continue to spend money on. Those who care more about the hobby aspect can build and paint to their heart's content and play casual, fun games with whatever master they want. And players who like to see the story move can cheer for certain results in tournaments and special events that will advance the story in interesting ways.

I'm not saying make the game "worse" or "unplayable" for certain players, but supporting different formats that encourage players of all stripes to continue to engage with the game seems like a strictly good idea. We can all win out of this.

[Saduhem]

44 minutes ago, Parker Barrows said:

I'm assuming models will be able to have multiple keywords like now.

I'm fairly sure they will have multiple keywords otherwise you're going to see the same Masters with the same crews all the time. I hope the DMH Masters get treated nicely with such keywords and have balanced synergies. 

I have to say, there seems to be a lot of thought put into this. Can't wait to playtest it (If I get in the Beta). How did you get the TOS backer Avatar? As a fellow backer, I would love one too!

[Parker Barrows]

30 minutes ago, Saduhem said:

I have to say, there seems to be a lot of thought put into this. Can't wait to playtest it (If I get in the Beta). How did you get the TOS backer Avatar? As a fellow backer, I would love one too!

Go to the Kickstarter. Go to Updates. Scroll to the bottom. They're in Backer Update #1.

[Kyris]

34 minutes ago, admiralvorkraft said:

As someone who made a post that could be construed as critical of some/all of those complaining about their "lost" masters, allow me to elaborate.

You are allowed to feel however you want. Your feelings are valid. However your feelings don't change the fact that the current game-state makes competitive play basically a joke. The shift towards optimized aggro crews is a natural extension of there being so much crap in the game right now that the only way to reliably deal with it is to just clear the board. It's like if every chess game saw you sitting down across a board and looking at sixteen models that moved in ways you vaguely recognized but didn't really understand. Rather than trying to play for the checkmate you almost have to first set the board to a simple enough state that you can accurately anticipate moves. It defeats the whole way the game is structured.

So to have a competitive Malifaux scene you need a way to limit the variables to some quasi-human manageable number. To do that you need to streamline the game somewhat and introduce a limiting factor on the number of models that players need to be familiar with. The first one is obviously a goal of M3E but the second one is tricky. It's tricky because some people have an emotional investment in their crews - that's to be expected - and it's tricky because Wyrd needs to keep people buying models. The only way to satisfy the first and third priorities (maintaining a competitive scene and profits within the business model) is to impose a rolling limited format. Say 7 masters per faction, 10 henchmen, etc. 

Satisfying the the emotional needs of individuals to see their well loved models on the tabletop means a compromise. I think that a good place to start is updating those masters and other models that have rotated out of "standard" so that they are playable under the active rules-set and are balanced for good casual play - meaning that they aren't rigorously tested in all combinations and scenarios, but that they are put on the table a few times with their theme crew and are reasonably fun for both players.

Now if Wyrd intends to move to a rotating format (and I really hope they do) then I think they need to do so very intentionally, and communicate proactively. This is especially important with the US Masters Tour coming online. That way those of us who are committed wargamers first, last, and always have a continually balanced and supported game that we can continue to spend money on. Those who care more about the hobby aspect can build and paint to their heart's content and play casual, fun games with whatever master they want. And players who like to see the story move can cheer for certain results in tournaments and special events that will advance the story in interesting ways.

I'm not saying make the game "worse" or "unplayable" for certain players, but supporting different formats that encourage players of all stripes to continue to engage with the game seems like a strictly good idea. We can all win out of this.

I don't think it's purely an emotional response, though. I'm against invalidating player choice and player purchases merely on principle. Yeah, I don't like losing lilith. But even if we kept lilith I'd still be against it.

[phloog]

9 hours ago, Tors said:

So after investing hundreds of whatever currency to buy most models and master (maybe even painting them in hundreds of hours) your reasoning is to sell most of them because there MAY be events, where you possibly can't field less than half a dozen of them? Indeed - odd. 

This Thread Is full of raging and panicking about Masters being deleted and at the end of the day, there will be what? Around 10% of the Events which disallow the dead mens Hand...

Organizers want fully booked events, there is literally no reason to even potenially anger their playerbase. 

that was ONE of my options: selling off.

The OTHER OPTION I mentioned was sticking with 2e...I certainly have enough models for decades of endless fun, which is a positive, and sticking with 2e means that I can't use new releases...but I can use my OLD releases.

In the end of course it's their call, but I find it a bit laughable that they're doing this to the game as if the fiction is more important.

It's NOT about events...I guess I should have been more clear.  It's about the near certainty that there will be areas of imbalance in the "dead" models that will almost certainly never be addressed...it is also about the company philosophy on display here...this is a goofy move.

I get that they have to reinvent things and try to shake things up..it's just a silly approach.  Peoplr who really embraced the low-entry cost skirmish philosophy now have to worry the 1 or 2 masters they had don't count anymore.  People who went apesh*t are almost certainly finding chunks of their investment that will get no/inferior support.

Pretty sure my three buddies and I will just stick with 2e...but if someone has a pile or cash lying around.

[Nosilloc]

A couple thoughts. 

You know how there is still only one replacement card for Survivor? Please don’t do that with the new faction packs. And I’m also, with the others that are going to be disappointed if I have to play my brand new nightmare crews with cards for the original crew and not cool nightmare versions. 

Speaking of cards, and their size increasing, I know you have found sleeves for your intended size but think of storage as well. I personally keep mine in a binder and would like to continue doing so. It makes it much easier for me to build crews on the fly during tournaments.

Something I saw continuesly were people who bought m1e crews and wanted to get just the henchmen from the m2e box seeing that was the only way to get the new henchmen and they already owned the crew. So please, don’t rerelease crews with just one new model and make that the only way to get it.

Just wondering if this is the same Mason from L5R. If so, you remember how deckbuilding changed from Samurai to Celestial when they almost enforced themed deck builds with almost all the cards getting keyworded? It got really annoying sometimes. 

[admiralvorkraft]

3 hours ago, Kyris said:

I don't think it's purely an emotional response, though. I'm against invalidating player choice and player purchases merely on principle. Yeah, I don't like losing lilith. But even if we kept lilith I'd still be against it.

Okay, but by doing nothing they "invalidate" competitive play whereas this way you still have perfectly "valid" rules for your models in casual and semi-competitive settings.

I played casual MtG for years, the changing format didn't somehow "invalidate" any of my purchases. 

[Mason]

7 hours ago, Phinn said:

Mister @Mason, can a model have multiple Keywords?😃🙂

Absolutely, though it doesn't happen all that often.

[Mason]

44 minutes ago, Nosilloc said:

Just wondering if this is the same Mason from L5R. If so, you remember how deckbuilding changed from Samurai to Celestial when they almost enforced themed deck builds with almost all the cards getting keyworded? It got really annoying sometimes. 

Same Mason!

[L5R Stuff]

Without going into too much of a tangent, I think that the focus on themed decks was the right away for AEG to go. L5R was a complex and complicated game, and the theme, story, and clan loyalty kept them afloat even through particularly bad arcs.

As far as being annoying, I'm afraid that I have to disagree. I played Shadowlands/Spider for years, and most of the time prior to Celestial, we were at the bottom of the pack because we just got a random collection of cards, of which a handful were "okay-ish," instead of anything that meshed into any sort of well-thought-out theme. Once Celestial rolled around and the design team started paying more attention to keywords and themes, Spider was finally able to run decks that weren't just a handful of unrelated cards tossed into a deck. Fields of the Dead and Shadowed Dojo were super fun, and they both received enough support to make them viable. Compared to previous arcs, where Ruined City and Spider's Lair received barely any support and our tournament wins were few and far between... well, I'm on the side of Celestial Edition's themed decks.

[/L5R stuff]

[Fetid Strumpet]

Side note, best gaming experience I ever had was playing in the original Day of Thunder tournament at gen con. Got knocked from the tourney because I was playing a pekkle bomb dishonor deck and got paired against a shadowlands hoard deck high in the Swiss. Good times.

[Saduhem]

3 minutes ago, admiralvorkraft said:

Okay, but by doing nothing they "invalidate" competitive play whereas this way you still have perfectly "valid" rules for your models in casual and semi-competitive settings.

I played casual MtG for years, the changing format didn't somehow "invalidate" any of my purchases. 

It's a case by case issue, and I think that's what is creating so much tumult on the Dead Man Hand front. 
A person that wants to play Collodi at a tournament may be able to do so at the TO's discretion (And I believe this will mostly be the case), but that same person can be worried about future "Collodi models". This person has the right to feel like his purchases were invalidated because models he bought and painted are no longer recognized as being tournament official until the TO "lets you" use DMH models.

Another person in the same situation is not going to care about the DMH label and enjoy the game as if nothing had happened. Just as people don't mind playing casual MTG. Although it must be kept in mind that, unlike Malifaux, MTG cards are meant to be out of the current cycle once enough new ones come in. No one was told "your models are going to be dead at some point" when they bought into this game. In fact, everything from first edition carried over and was legal to use.

I think a lot of it has to do with:
1- Promoting cross faction hiring and purchasing (which is the only way I can see new money get invested in the game to keep it alive)
2- Having a set amount of masters available for "release" for each faction 
3- Making the Lore and the Universe mesh with the new M3e Marketing strategy.

As much as I am personally hurt by the relegation of some of my models to DMH, I also would not be able to propose a better way of handling these things.

Do people get to feel like they wasted time buying, assembling, painting, learning, and playing some Masters? Yes, they do, and no one can decide they don't get to feel this way.
Are other people going to be ok with it? Of course!

Most frustration doesn't come from bad news, but from uncertainty. Once some questions are answered, the whole issue will probably slowly fade away, although there will be some justified mourning in the process.

Will the same resources be invested in the development and testing of the DMH masters?
Will more models be released that are meant to be played mainly with them?
Will DMH masters not receive full support and instead be re-released in the future?

I'm not even sure that Mason has completely decided on all this. Lots of testing will probably help guide and refine decisions. 
This is very likely what the game needed. Every single change I have seen so far really refines Malifaux. I see some money making decisions in here too, but if the game doesn't sell, we don't get to play. Right now the DMH is the one controversial issue but, seeing how clean everything else is from a development perspective, it might get ironed out just fine.

DMH hurts for me, and it is going to hurt for a lot of people simply because we spent money and resources for models that now have a vague aura of uncertainty surrounding them. It's going to hurt for a few more people across the community.
Will this benefit the game? Probably yes. Do people have the right to feel hurt? Absolutely yes.
 

[Nosilloc]

10 minutes ago, Mason said:

Same Mason!

[L5R Stuff]

Without going into too much of a tangent, I think that the focus on themed decks was the right away for AEG to go. L5R was a complex and complicated game, and the theme, story, and clan loyalty kept them afloat even through particularly bad arcs.

As far as being annoying, I'm afraid that I have to disagree. I played Shadowlands/Spider for years, and most of the time prior to Celestial, we were at the bottom of the pack because we just got a random collection of cards, of which a handful were "okay-ish," instead of anything that meshed into any sort of well-thought-out theme. Once Celestial rolled around and the design team started paying more attention to keywords and themes, Spider was finally able to run decks that weren't just a handful of unrelated cards tossed into a deck. Fields of the Dead and Shadowed Dojo were super fun, and they both received enough support to make them viable. Compared to previous arcs, where Ruined City and Spider's Lair received barely any support and our tournament wins were few and far between... well, I'm on the side of Celestial Edition's themed decks.

[/L5R stuff]

Cool, I thought that was you.

I had to jump clans because I felt I was forced to play breeder seeing it started with the most support. What I wanted to continue playing was my huge beefy, tainted, samurai and all I could find were tiny ones who “said they were tainted”. I can’t see my frustrations being able to transfer to Malifaux much but it doesn’t stop me from being concerned. 

 

[admiralvorkraft]

@Saduhem - I definitely agree that I want greater clarity as to what's going on with the DMH and what it will be used for going forwards. For example, I think that people should know that named models (arbitrary distinction) have 5 years eligibility in Standard format. After that point they may be reworked and re-released or retired from Standard indefinitely.

For perspective, I'm back after about a 6 month hiatus that I took because the game state is so bad post Wave 5. I was feeling like the several hundred dollars I've spent on the game have been largely invalidated because I was investing in a dynamic game that was balanced for competitive play and that was just clearly not the case anymore. If I'd bought into the game as a fun way to kick back with friends, or because I wanted to spend a lot of time converting and painting, then I wouldn't have been bothered. The DMH seems like a way to keep the game relevant for competitive players and also maintain support for casual/hobbyist gamers.

But again, you're right, Wyrd needs to be super clear and consistent about the DMH models. To that end I would actually like them to be stricter about how the DMH interacts with competitive play  - no DMH models in Masters qualifying events, but allowed in non-master "legacy" tournaments. Something like that.

[Mason]

27 minutes ago, admiralvorkraft said:

But again, you're right, Wyrd needs to be super clear and consistent about the DMH models. To that end I would actually like them to be stricter about how the DMH interacts with competitive play  - no DMH models in Masters qualifying events, but allowed in non-master "legacy" tournaments. Something like that.

 

I think we were pretty clear about the Dead Man's Hand when it was brought up on the first page:

Quote

All of these Masters (and their totems) will receive updated stat cards in M3E in a special "Dead Man's Hand" pack. By default, they will not be tournament legal (due to being absent in the story), but an option will exist to allow these "Dead Man's Hand" Masters to be played in tournaments that wish to allow it.

 

[WWHSD]

1 hour ago, admiralvorkraft said:

To that end I would actually like them to be stricter about how the DMH interacts with competitive play  - no DMH models in Masters qualifying events, but allowed in non-master "legacy" tournaments. Something like that.

You probably want to talk to the folks that run those tournaments and see what they intend to do. I’m guessing that they won’t want to make any commitments until after M3E and whatever the accompanying Gaining Grounds type document has been released and they have had a chance to read them.

 As far as I know most “Masters” events and their qualifying events have nothing to do with Wyrd (other than prize and other organized play support).

[Yvarre]

Thinking about it all some more, I'm pretty excited for some new sculpts.  Malifaux is my first and only minis game, and I was learning to paint on some of my favorite masters' boxes.  Also, many of my models were painted in huge waves in preparation for events such as Captaincon, The Nova Open, and Bragging Rights (131, baby).  Naturally, while functional on the table, I'm not winning any painting contests.  In fact, even though I kept us in the win column for games, my team took 3rd at Bragging Rights 2016 by only 3/4 of a point below 2nd because of some of my rushed models not looking so hot and getting me the bare minimum for painting score.  Like my second strongest 2E master, McCabe, I want redemption.

Enter the opportunity to start again on new sculpts!  I also have a sneaking suspicion that we are going to get the McCabe, Lynch, and Yan Lo sculpts from Broken Promises, and I find Lynch and Yan Lo's new art to be more dynamic than the old sculpts and the new McCabe art is super fun and fits his character a bit more for what I want that the Indiana Jones version, though I got a really nice effect of being a little bloodied and scuffed up from falling off of his horse.  So now, after painting over 100 models, I feel like I might just start being able to do this wonderful art some justice, and I really want a nicer looking Lynch.

As my resources of money and time are also tight at the moment, I still have an entirely functional collection to play the game with, and I can take my time painting any new models that strike my fancy.  Whereas before most of my efforts of building and painting were geared towards having crews ready for competitive play; now I can take my time and focus on the hobby aspect of the game.  That's cool.

[admiralvorkraft]

@Mason - I read what y'all have said about DMH. What we the player base will need to know moving forward (I understand that this isn't available at this time, it's complicated) is who will end up in the DMH and how long we have until that happens. We also need to know sooner rather than later if any other models are being DMH'd. We need to know if masters currently in the DMH can be expected to be brought into the standard set, or if they are out of competitive play for the edition (and, again, approximately how long that will be).

We need firm expectations about what the DMH actually means - and this speaks to WWHSD's point below. Does it mean 90% of nothing because most TO's are going to ignore it? Or will Wyrd be imposing some incentive for it to actually be adhered to (different tournament formats, etc)? 

We also need to have an idea of the intent. Because currently it sounds like masters were DMH'd more or less "for fun" or because some writer or another decided that's where the story would go. And if that's actually where we're at then I really do empathize with the folks who are upset. On the other hand, if I'm reading it right and it's a way to add new models while keeping the game viable on a competitive level then we need to know that. Partially so that we can plan purchasing if tournament play is important to us, but also so that we (I) can continue to be really vocal in defending the choice as it gets implemented.

I'm doing a lot of guessing and wishful thinking right now because I'm excited about the game for the first time in over a year. I think that the M3E news is overwhelmingly positive and I want the change to be as smooth as possible. The one shadow is the uncertainty around the DMH - about what it will actually, concretely mean to the average player next year and five years down the road. I understand that information may not yet exist, y'all were wrong footed by the leaks and that sucks, but the sooner we can know what impact this will have on our daily experience of the game the better.

[WWHSD]

54 minutes ago, admiralvorkraft said:

@Mason - I read what y'all have said about DMH. What we the player base will need to know moving forward (I understand that this isn't available at this time, it's complicated) is who will end up in the DMH and how long we have until that happens. We also need to know sooner rather than later if any other models are being DMH'd. We need to know if masters currently in the DMH can be expected to be brought into the standard set, or if they are out of competitive play for the edition (and, again, approximately how long that will be).

We need firm expectations about what the DMH actually means - and this speaks to WWHSD's point below. Does it mean 90% of nothing because most TO's are going to ignore it? Or will Wyrd be imposing some incentive for it to actually be adhered to (different tournament formats, etc)? 

We also need to have an idea of the intent. Because currently it sounds like masters were DMH'd more or less "for fun" or because some writer or another decided that's where the story would go. And if that's actually where we're at then I really do empathize with the folks who are upset. On the other hand, if I'm reading it right and it's a way to add new models while keeping the game viable on a competitive level then we need to know that. Partially so that we can plan purchasing if tournament play is important to us, but also so that we (I) can continue to be really vocal in defending the choice as it gets implemented.

I'm doing a lot of guessing and wishful thinking right now because I'm excited about the game for the first time in over a year. I think that the M3E news is overwhelmingly positive and I want the change to be as smooth as possible. The one shadow is the uncertainty around the DMH - about what it will actually, concretely mean to the average player next year and five years down the road. I understand that information may not yet exist, y'all were wrong footed by the leaks and that sucks, but the sooner we can know what impact this will have on our daily experience of the game the better.

There’s not really too much purchase planning you can do for M3E until more inormation on model keywords and their stats are available. Depending on where Wyrd is in the development cycle, that information may not even be finalized yet. 

Based on the info that we’ve gotten so far, I think the only change I’m going to make is that I’m not going to buy the merc models or models from a master’s expanded hiring pool that I’ve had  my eye on.