Thoughts about M3E

[Zebo]

What do you feel about what we know about the Outcast in M3E?



First, I’m not happy with the lose of Misaki, I really liked her ninja theme, and she was being my next master. I don’t care if she was better in TT, or if we had better options to make her work in Outcast. I play my crews because I like them, regardless of their “overpowerity”.



LEVETICUS

I like his playstyle in M2E. With good hand and/or resources he can launch a lot of damage, even after the nerf. He’s immortal. He can be anywhere you need. He can summon. And he can hire a large pool of models out of faction.



Now, he keeps respawning from Hollow Waifs and can put a lot of irreductible damage, but his mobility has gone. Now he has more health (unuseful in actual gamestyle) and we know nothing about his summoning and the miniature pool. He has new tricks like moving wounds between allies and stack the top of the deck (sorry, english is not my idiom and don’t understand what that stack means). His crew shares abilities to hurt enemies in their activations. It would be great if Unmade didn’t trigger when you win, seeing the low df the crew has.

Also Intrigued with his “natural” pool. Rusty Alyce, Marlena Webster, Ashes & Dust, Desolation Engine and Abominations feel a bit limited. Maybe Killjoy? Some out-of-faction like Necropunks and the Students?



PARKER BARROWS

A pure scheme manipulator, Parker Barrows has himself average damage output and toughness, while can buff his mates or generate cards and soulstones. Tricky to dominate, but funny to play.



It seems that all keeps almost the same. If he can steal the enemy’s resources instead of generate his own, it would be better. Probably the solid damage is the same he does now. Not sold on the crew’s ability to shoot when charging, not very sure of gunslingers charging to close combat to shoot their pistols, almost better to keep distances (and the run and gun action from Bandits was great).

In his crew are included Mad Dog, Benny Wolcomb, the Wokou Raiders, the Dead Outlaws, Bandidos and Sue (although I would like more to see Sue as Versatile, but easily could have both Mercenary and  Bandit traits). I can see also Big Jake, Convict Gunslingers and Desperate Mercs in theme with outlaws and cowboys (and redskins).



VON SCHILL

Well this is difficult to me. I’ve been playing him for a long time. Always VS with the Freikorps. And have realized his strenghts and weaknesses.

First I think the whole Freikorps crew was created to be like a counter. High damage? I have armor. Nukes? Freikorps suit. Dependant of poison? The Steamtrunk take it off. Fire, maybe? The Steamtrunk turns it off. Summoner? Both the steamtrunk and the Specialist can clear corpse and scrap markers. Not great weaknesses to exploit, also not great strenghts.

Before the wave 5, the freikorps had a little bit of many things. We had Trappers to shoot from far away, the Specialist for nukes and fire, Lazarus like a tough ranged tank, the Librarian with Ca attacks and healing, the Strongarm for close combat tanking, the Freikorpsmann like a “cheap” jack of all trades and Von Schill going and doing where and what his crew needed him. The Freikorpsmann were not good at anything for 5ss, the Specialist was also disappointing for being slow, weak and short ranged, they were very resource intensive and hadn’t any card draw form, and the game was moving to activation control, movement tricks that they hadn’t and also couldn’t deny. And the summoners now had quite easy ways to get corpse/scrap markers.

But with the wave 5 the things had changed a lot. The Engineer gave card drawing, a lot of surveillance an even more damage output. The new upgrades made the whole crew more ap efficient, but he best for me was that suddenly they have a way to face the pushes/places/summons in a bubble of 6” around Von Schill.



Now, it’s like this has changed. Von Schill keeps being a good warrior, but now he gives items to his crew. Not sure how it’s gonna work until I see it, but i’d like to keep punching/placing people around him and shooting anyone pushing or placing near him. It seems that not special ability for Freikorps (out of their gear).

These crew is easy to imagine. Hannah, Anna Lovelace, Strongarm, Lazarus, Specialist, Librarian, Trapper, Engineer and Freikorpsmann make a enough pool of troops.



VIKTORIAS



Well, those two where the Alpha Strike Glass Cannon Masters (allright, Master and Henchwoman) almost all their game was focused on Ashes slingshooting Blood like a nuke missile, Blood Killing everything in range and then dying or maybe charging any other place to keep killing.

I really liked the new tricks from the wave 5. Specially the turn-minions-into-sister upgrade, that turned Ashes in a little bit more support and less sling master.



We know little about the new Viktorias, only that now they share profiles. It’s logical to expect that the style of killy glass cannon keep being the same. The crew’s ability sound like al the crew can push 4” when somebody kills an enemy, so a very mobile crew (will the Viks keep their Whirlwind trigger? Could they trigger it and start a pushing way of destruction?)

Their pool… Vanessa, Ronin, probably Taelor… The usual mercs? Johan, Hans, Bishop, Convict Gunslingers, Desperate Mercs, maybe Big Jake and/or Sue



HAMELIN

Still not played him, but I understand you have basically two strategies, spread and exploit the Blight, and summon an horde of rats. He was THE summoner of the Outcast.



Now, that’s gone. Or at least that seems. He’s focused on the Blight mechanic, and nothing said about rat engine. Not sure if this is good, or even if nothing is said about rat engine because it’s not Hamelin’s thing, but rat and king and obedient, and still exists.

About crew pool, Nyx, Benny Wolcomb, Obedient Wretch, Rat Catchers, Rat Kings, The Flying Plague and Rats. Maybe other Childs, like Malifaux Child, Baby Kade, Candy, Iggy, and Crooligans.



TARA

Also don’t played, I know she has her tricks burying models and delivering beast. But not sure about her playstyle.



It seems that keeps burying people as primary tactic, but also is now the summoner of the faction (if rat engine is gone)... Fine with that, summoning her little beasts seems logical to me, and the mechanic of Tara giving fast to the enemies to end it and unbury her summons could be interesting.

Her crew is the Nothing Beast, Scion of the Void, Talos and Void Wretches… A little bit limited. Maybe Killjoy, Dead Marshalls or Guild Autopsies, but still feels like too few options.



JACK DAW

Other never played crew here. I know that Jack himself can put curses on his enemies, debuffing them and causing damage, but don’t know what his crew’s playstyle is.



The new Jack Daw… well, also an strange mechanic that switches his curses with card manipulation, drawing and discarding cards for different purposes.

His model pool seems a little bit short, with Montresor, the Crossroad seven (maybe), Dead Outlaws, and The guilty. ¿Maybe Nurses, Papá Loco, Serena Bowman, Jaakuna Ubume, the Hanged, the Drowned and Crooked man?



ZIPP

Never played or faced, or interested. I think it’s like a superfast mobile hitter that can debuff enemies, don’t know.

What I know is that I liked more the ninja crew.



In the other hand, not sure what to expect with some outcast models that doesn't fill in any gap. Where do you think are gonna go Aionus, Ama no Zako, Carver, Killjoy, The Midnight Stalker or Prospectors?

[CapnBloodbeard]

Why is the text white?  I can't read it without highlighting...(and I'm not going to highlight something just so I can read it).  

[-Loki-]

edit

 

 

[Adran]

6 minutes ago, -Loki- said:

How do you know this about how they work now? No Outcasts were shown at Gencon.

If you've got access to cards, it's probably not best to talk about them in public? Even if the Beta has already started, as it's a closed beta, I'm sure there would be a private location to discuss it.

He has read the website for M3 from the look of it. 

The white text is hard to read on a phone, so I've not looked in depth , but a lot of it seems fine details are what worry people. Having seen the first to second transition, the feel of the masters was preserved, even if the play changed, so I would not worry about individual actions, they will change. Outcasts as a whole seem to have possibly the least change this edition change, at least that we have seen. I was surprised leviticus wasn't dmh, he has caused such a rules problem over the last 2 editions, that not having to balance him again would have tempted me. 

[-Loki-]

40 minutes ago, Adran said:

He has read the website for M3 from the look of it. 

The white text is hard to read on a phone, so I've not looked in depth , but a lot of it seems fine details are what worry people. Having seen the first to second transition, the feel of the masters was preserved, even if the play changed, so I would not worry about individual actions, they will change. Outcasts as a whole seem to have possibly the least change this edition change, at least that we have seen. I was surprised Leveticus wasn't dmh, he has caused such a rules problem over the last 2 editions, that not having to balance him again would have tempted me. 

Yeah I edited out my post because after reviewing that page, it seemed to come from there. There's more information on those preview pages than I remembered.

[CapnBloodbeard]

Well thanks for changing the text colour.  Personally I don't think there's any point in worrying too much about what's in the blurbs - we won't know much until we see specifics and the rules.  

 

I'm a bit irritated that we didn't get a new master - just swapped one dual faction for another.  I feel like Outcasts tend to get forgotten a bit.  Even the one new master we got in late books (Parker) was a bit pants while other factions got amazing masters.  

 

Schill's I think looks interesting and quite thematic.  4" pushes for the entire Viks crew will be hard to handle.  

[Jesy Blue]

I'm excited to play Zipp.... I started with Voktoria which annoyed people, then did Hamelin, which annoyed people, then Brewmaster, which is annoying; Zipp, by design, is meant to be annoying, so I think I'm just destined to play him.

 

[Gnomezilla]

I am beyond excited to play Zipp. My meta is not.  He better still have pianos!!!

 

As far as Leveticus’ crew goes, wounds becoming a joint resource for all the crew to share and optimize appeals strongly to the necro in me (in other games, if there is a hit point-to-mana conversion I will abuse it down to a sliver of life, just to keep the spells flying). However, that still means playing him, instead of something inherently awesome, like Zipp.

[SAYNE]

Parker's ability to charge and shoot seems to facilitate the run and gun play since charge is a single action I believe. It never said they need to use their guns in melee I don't think? So for example. Parker "charges" perpendicular to an enemy model and shoots. Then "charges" back to his original location and shoots again. It's basically a free shot every time you move... At least that's what I'd hope for and believe would make sense. Especially if they keep their middling damage tracks or low accuracy. Bandits aren't known for their crackshots. Just tons of feckin' bullets

[whodares]

I'm wondering how drastic the change to Hamelin is going to be. As you said there has been no mention of rats, but they do serve a decent part of the Blight engine, so not all hope is lost there. I'm thinking of getting the entire cat set to play him in a cat theme, but I'm stalling it due to this uncertainty.

I'm also hoping they keep them because it made him rather unique. If they change him to being a full Blight master, he's not that much different in concept from Expunge McMourning imo.

[solkan]

1 hour ago, whodares said:

I'm wondering how drastic the change to Hamelin is going to be. As you said there has been no mention of rats, but they do serve a decent part of the Blight engine, so not all hope is lost there. I'm thinking of getting the entire cat set to play him in a cat theme, but I'm stalling it due to this uncertainty.

I'm also hoping they keep them because it made him rather unique. If they change him to being a full Blight master, he's not that much different in concept from Expunge McMourning imo.

Oh, we all know the answer to this one.

Everyone who owns a Hamelin or any rats during the time of M2E will be required by M3E to publicly apologize during a game.  Even if they aren’t playing Outcasts.  ✌️

On a more serious note, I asked about model limits for things like Mindless Zombies And was told that certain cases like that may be given exceptions.  But you’re still going to have a limit, one way or the other.  Though by definition, because there’s a beta, the details are subject to change.  ( It’s not like Mason’s going to say “Malifaux Rats are no longer valid models.”  )

Buying one box of everything is going to be safe.  Even if rats change how they work, they’ll still do something.  Just don’t look at the current “In M2E, I could theoretically have X rats and Y rat kings and Z rat catchers in play at once, and that’ll require multiple boxes...” and think it’s certain to get grandfathered in at the two box limit.

 

[CapnBloodbeard]

10 hours ago, Gnomezilla said:

I am beyond excited to play Zipp. My meta is not.  He better still have pianos!!!

 

As far as Leveticus’ crew goes, wounds becoming a joint resource for all the crew to share and optimize appeals strongly to the necro in me (in other games, if there is a hit point-to-mana conversion I will abuse it down to a sliver of life, just to keep the spells flying). However, that still means playing him, instead of something inherently awesome, like Zipp.

Any ideas how Zipp will link in with existing Outcast models?  

Some masters you get something really distinctive by playing them in each of their 2 factions.  Misaki, I always felt, was poor as a dual faction master.  There was nothing special in playing her as Outcasts - she was fairly unpopular too.  It was almost like 'well, you can play her in this faction, only she's half as effective, but you can use Lazarus I guess?'  

So I wonder, not only what Zipp brings to the Outcasts, but what Outcasts bring to Zipp.

I literally know nothing about Zipp

[katadder]

Misaki was great in outcasts, survivalist, oathkeeper and Marlena made her a hard to kill missile that thunders misaki could not be and I am sad to lose her as she has never lost me a game (even in a misaki off)

Declared Faction: Outcasts 
Crew Name: outcast misaki  50ss 
Leader: Misaki - Cache:(2)
   Survivalist 1ss 
   Stalking Bisento 2ss 
   Oath Keeper 1ss 
Shang 3ss 
Yamaziko 6ss 
   Scramble 1ss 
Bishop 9ss 
   Scramble 1ss 
Sue 8ss 
   Return Fire 1ss 
Marlena Webster 8ss 
Hodgepodge Effigy 4ss 
Oiran 5ss 
 

[Jesy Blue]

Zipp and Sky Pirates have all the synergy that Parker wished he had with Bandits.  Seriously, what does being a Bandit do for you?

Sky Pirates have overlapping tricks between the 3 model types (Zipp, First Mate, & and Iron Skeerers), as well as the totem, Earl Burns, plus the discount on Sky Pirate upgrades.

Compare that to the fact that there is not even a single Bandit upgrade and of the 6 Bandit models, only Parker has any abilities that does anything to the keyword Bandit, and they're mostly meh.

Sky Pirates are a team; Bandits are just rabble.

[Nukemouse]

Rat engine being gone doesn't mean hamelin won't be able to summon rats. I suspect it simply means rat kings will no longer be able to become rat catchers or that hamelin will give his opponent pass tokens when he summons so the engine wont generate free activations.
Zipp's totem buffs constructs so perhaps he will be able to make use of levi's thematic crew and lazarus. Many mercenaries like sue, hans, ama no zako, bishop etc will no longer be hireable outside of faction supposedly so access to those models could be very handy. Personally i want to see if it will be possible to leverage his high speed with something to push him further up the board to snipe a low health enemy model and unleash killjoy.

[McSkip]

What we can read about Levis in M3E sounds good. Stacking the top of the deck means card manipulation which is really nice. Moving health from modells sounds also like a lot of fun. And all the passive damage defensive triggers and abilities are superb!

[Fenriel]

I'm torn on so many of these. Trying to stay optimistic until more facts roll in.

Hamelin - I never thought I'd like this guy and now I find myself wishing I'd play him anytime I play something else. I have a bad feeling he's going to loose alot of his rat love in interest of  balance. I'm against pass tokens at this point. I loved the concept of balancing more ap that did less versus less ap that did more. (Elite versus non-elite crews). 

Viks - I'd like them to be a bit less one trick pony, but you can't deny their style and I hope they keep it.

VS - My original master. Wave 5 made me want to play him again. 

Daw - 2nd master. Love his curses, disliked how squishy he'd become. I like the idea of dual faction rezzers. I already used quite a few due to the tormented keyword.

Parker - I always wanted him to be as cool as his theme. Maybe 3E will deliver.

Zipp - My 2nd faction is gremlins and I'm just starting to play him. It's hard to tell what he'll be like in outcasts until we get a better feel for keyword stuff.

Levi - If they take away his ability to hire undead/constructs, I think he'll loose alot of his unique flavor.

MIsaki - Bleh I always prefered the Viks anyway.

Tara - I actually think the rezzers should have taken her full time. 

[Mason]

7 minutes ago, Fenriel said:

Hamelin - I never thought I'd like this guy and now I find myself wishing I'd play him anytime I play something else. I have a bad feeling he's going to loose alot of his rat love in interest of  balance.

I wouldn't worry too much, frankly.

7 minutes ago, Fenriel said:

Levi - If they take away his ability to hire undead/constructs, I think he'll loose alot of his unique flavor.

Leveticus' expanded hiring is no more.

It broke the design process about thirty times too many.

 

[McSkip]

Daw was also my second master. 6 wounds and damage reduce with cards sounds really tempting. But whats about modells that ignore damage reduction? That would be a hard counter for Daw

[Fenriel]

17 minutes ago, Mason said:

I wouldn't worry too much, frankly.

Leveticus' expanded hiring is no more.

It broke the design process about thirty times too many.

 

This makes me very sad. Also helpful since I can stop buying models for him  I really should ask this in the gremlins forum but just in case you are still watching, does this mean mama Z is loosing her ability to hire WP <= 4 folks as well?

[whodares]

1 hour ago, Mason said:

I wouldn't worry too much, frankly.

Welp, there goes my wallet. When's the next sale of the cat boxes? Black Friday? Gonna be a black day for my wallet indeed then

[touchdown]

The new charge rules don't mention moving towards the target. So conceivably, with Run and Gun you could charge away from the target while still taking a shot. I think that would be pretty powerful.

[KID55]

12 hours ago, Mason said:

Leveticus' expanded hiring is no more.

It broke the design process about thirty times too many.

😭 I have about 1/3 of my models from other fraction for him... And what about 4-Riders-team? It's will gone too?

 

[touchdown]

I'm really curious to see what Parker's abilities look like in M3E.

If he can still cycle Stick Up to move and do pushes, and comes with Doc Mitchel (the best healer in Outcasts), he'd be a hell of a combo with the Viks.

(I think it's safe to assume the Viks will still be hell close combat)