Shield Bearers or Belles with Reva?

[Anung Un Rama]

I have played my first two games with Reva and won both. My list has been Reva, Emissary, Philip and the Nanny, Bete Noire 2 belles and a necropunk.

I really enjoy the utility and price of belles and I am trying to work out whether i should give the shield bearers a go or not. the emissary has been good but i feel the mindless zombie i am basically bringing him for isnt making a big difference, i have no troubles with corpse markers and I am trying to decide whether to try something different in the crew.

Ant thought?

[Ludvig]

I would always advice you to try something different as soon as you get the hang of what you are doing. The whole point is to have an enjoyable time and switching up the models keep sit interesting. I would even advice you to try playing without the models that you conaider too good to play without every now and then. Keeping the game fresh and exciting is how you enjoy it. You don't want to end up winning every game but hating th game because you feel you don't have options.

[Adran]

I would always suggest trying something different. I'm a big fan of building the list to match the game, so don't count anything as a must have. 

There are a lot of different models and opponents out there, and finding out what other models do is always going to help your game. 

[Sagrit]

As for me Emissary is not just for Zombies in Reva crew, but for Shards to block LoS and Charge passes and he is also extremely useful because his (1)Claims of the Dead and sometimes even (0)Carrion Feeder from Reva's Conflux. You can see why when you have Covert Breakthrough or Search the Ruins in the pool. Or even Set Up, Dig Their Graves, Guarded Treasures and Inescapable trap. Ability to place a Scheme marker ignoring 4" restricition (Interract) is HUGE sometimes.

As for other models you can try with Reva i would say that Dead Doxy are always good. Lampad have really nice synergy with Reva and if you take MLH it will be even better. Bone Piles works great for Ours or Symbols of Authority, especially with Reva's Guises of Death Upgrade - just place a Candle near the most complicated Symbol on the start of the game and unbury Bone Pile on Turn 2 to grab it.

If you want to try something ... unique to Reva, i would recommend try an Alpha Strike with Killjoy+Bete Noir. It's high risk high reward combo, so just try it in friendly play couple of times before the Tournament. The idea is simple:
- Hire Killjoy and Bete Noir both with Unnerving Aura
- Both of them starts buried
- Take Guises of Death and Blood Mark Upgrades on Reva
- Take 1 or even 2 MLH on someone (Philip, Lampad for example)
- Deploy Reva on the edge of Standart deployment zone (with other deployment its much easier)
- Place first "free" Candle in 15" from Reva
- Use soulstone to cycle 2 cards
- Win Initiative
- Activate 1-2 MLH to get 1-2 cards
- First activation Reva, place second Candle in 8". Make a Walk towards the first Candle.
- Use (1)Blood Mark, push Candle 5" towards group of enemy models, use Candle's (0), kill it, cycle 1 card, unbury Killjoy and Bete. 
- Use (1)Blood Mark, push second Candle 5" towards Killjoy, use it's (0), kill it, cycle card and give Chain Activation to Killjoy.
- Activate Killjoy, charge, have fun  
You will have 4 cards cycled and 1-2 draw before the Charge, so it's a good chances to get good crads and Masks for Killjoy's trgger to repeat an attack. Try to place Killjoy in a way to get as many opponents in Unnerving Aura and Blood Mark range as possible. Now you opponent have to decide what to do - deal with already activated Killjoy and suffer some damage from Black Blood, try to disingage to prevent Unnerving Aura damage or focus on Bete. Because your second activation will be Bete Noir charging same group of models and add another one Unnerving Aura bubble in opponents deployment  

I must say it again - it's mostly for fun, because lot of things can goes wrong. You can have bad cards even after all those card cycles. Opponent can spread models during deployment phase. Opponent can have Set Up, Public Demostration and will be glad to see couple of Henchmans in deployment Turn 1...

Just be flexible, you don't have to Alpha Strike on first activation of first Turn. But you can do it with Reva  

[Anung Un Rama]

Thanks guys some good food for thought... @Sagrit interesting i might give that a try!

[Anung Un Rama]

@Sagrit i gather corner deployment makes the alpha strike harder?

[Ludvig]

7 hours ago, Saucy Jack said:

@Sagrit i gather corner deployment makes the alpha strike harder?

With guises of death you will always br able to pop Killjoy and Bete from that corpse candle. Deployment makes zero difference. 

[Figgyfigs]

Shieldbearers are nice for any Scheme or Strategy that involves maintaining a presence in a certain position. They're also good at tying up 1-2 enemy models for something like Cursed Object.

They're surprisingly tanky for a minion, and if I take two at the beginning of a game, I can usually count on having at least one left by the end.

[Adran]

1 hour ago, Figgyfigs said:

Shieldbearers are nice for any Scheme or Strategy that involves maintaining a presence in a certain position. They're also good at tying up 1-2 enemy models for something like Cursed Object.

They're surprisingly tanky for a minion, and if I take two at the beginning of a game, I can usually count on having at least one left by the end.

Its not too surprising when you remember you need to double their wounds,  so you're looking at an effective 8 wound model with a possible Df6 and a sort of hard to kill in the middle for only 6 ss.

[Figgyfigs]

Plus Armor 1, and a free bonus when they die. Decent defenses, decent Wk.

I don't often have them near people who are using Soulstones, but if you do, they also get fast when that happens.

Not a bad model at all.

[DcVenom]

I tend to run both yin and asura with Reva, both have worked well for me. Asura gives me an extra mindless zombie a turn (gives one a decent attack a turn too), yin is great for putting people on negs to wp and ca duels. 

Worked great for me vs. Misaki and allowed me to kill her in one activation with Reva. 

[Figgyfigs]

Yin's also nice for preventing overeager enemies from getting to Reva. You can use her as a buffer, forcing them to get past her stickiness before they can have a shot at the champ.