Marshalls viability

[Cronex13]

Hello again all,

So today I want to talk about the Marshalls. Given how building crews works in this edition, all of the Marshalls seem to be in a good place so that no matter what master you choose, you can bring in some anti undead shenanigans in the form of minions and henchmen.

That in mind, I'm struggling to see the Marshalls viability if lead by Lady Justice. If you happen to be facing undead than that is just great, no problem at all. But on the face of things, these guys all tend to be a bit costy and only preform well against undead. Now keep in mind here I'm looking not to talk smack about my baby girl (Lady J) but instead to be educated on how to use her crew better.

I know that there are ways to make enemies undead (Corpse tamers, Excorcist and DM recruiter) but given how much every individual model cost and the fact that this edition isn't solely about combat, I require guidance.

[Cronex13]

My God! I just realized that DM are 5 points instead of 6 and have both Hard to Wound and Hard to Kill. I severely underestimated them.

[Hot4Perdita]

There are a couple of Marshall models that can make enemy models have the Undead characteristic. One is the Domador I believe. I think the other might be the Exorcist. Those would be crucial for the rest of your crew to capitalize on the undead buffs.

[Cronex13]

Right, I see those. And given that DM are cheaper than I thought, I'm not as offended. I think now my question is more about who to use as scheme runners. I tend to throw packs of guild hounds in to chase my schemes but does anyone have a Marshall related alternative? Models that synergize well with the crew if not?

[trikk]

What makes Marshals strong is the fact they have Hard to Wound, which in an edition of everlasting focus is pretty great.

Jury and Judge are gold and I think I'll have them in a lot of crews.

Domadors have an obey for the Emissary and an autoheal which is super big.

DMs are super tough for 5SS

Exorcists are....ok.

Lone Marshal is a Sh7 guy that hunts down scheme runners. I do wish he had Ride With Me but he wouldn't be that Lone then

 

I think the Recruiters are pretty meh and should be versatile but I haven't played them so it's more of a theory.

 

[Hot4Perdita]

30 minutes ago, trikk said:

What makes Marshals strong is the fact they have Hard to Wound, which in an edition of everlasting focus is pretty great.

Jury and Judge are gold and I think I'll have them in a lot of crews.

Domadors have an obey for the Emissary and an autoheal which is super big.

DMs are super tough for 5SS

Exorcists are....ok.

Lone Marshal is a Sh7 guy that hunts down scheme runners. I do wish he had Ride With Me but he wouldn't be that Lone then

 

I think the Recruiters are pretty meh and should be versatile but I haven't played them so it's more of a theory.

 

I’ve yet to play a 3e game yet, but I’ve been studying the Marshalls, and I think at least one DM recruiter should be in a crew. They can attack buried models regardless of LOS and range. Get a few DMs or Emissary, etc. to pine box a few enemies, then attack with the recruiter from a safe distance. 

 

As as far as Lone Marshall, I used to love that model in 2e. He could push shoot and    push. Now, he’s a little dry. I’d more favor the Pale Rider, all because of ride with me. He can get Lady J I to the right position. Unfortunately, as you stated, the big drawback to Lone Marshall is the lack of ride with me, which every other horse model seems to have except him. Bummer.

[trikk]

The cost 8 for Recruiters is way to big for me. They have a meh dmg track that even focus doesn't help much and in Marshals it's hard to use Grim Recruitment. I'd either prefer to have a Domador or effigy+up/steward

 

Lone Marshal was very bad in M2E. In M3E he can at least complete some schemes and he's pretty durable

[eddy]

Death marshal recruiters are sick... in a Dashel crew. I gladly take them even at 9ss to give all my minions second life especialy super usefull with guild patrols take hit. 

[4thstringer]

I've been running the following crew with pretty good success:

LJ-LLC

Judge

Jury

Scales

Pale Rider

Lone Marshall

EITHER a death marshall, effigy w/upgrade or extra stones.

 

This list puts out a lot of ranged threat and gets around pretty well.  Judge gets you cards when he isn't randomly shitting the bed (my last game).  LJ does LJ things.

One thing to watch out for.  Against Zoraida, Zoraida can obey the Jury to obey someone to charge her, controlling both flips, and then declare her trigger to reflect the damage back onto the attacking model.  Its card intensive, but man does it feel bad.

[trikk]

You can put LLC on Jury. That's 2 damage blocked

 

[explorator]

Hard to Wound AND Hard to Kill is a sick combo. I have not really used Pine Box much at all, it is usually better to just to damage. Now, it is nice in certain situations, just more of a secondary attack in most games.

[Cronex13]

1 minute ago, explorator said:

Hard to Wound AND Hard to Kill is a sick combo. I have not really used Pine Box much at all, it is usually better to just to damage. Now, it is nice in certain situations, just more of a secondary attack in most games.

Don't underestimate the intimidation factor. For whatever reason, players are terrified of going into the box and I constantly see them dump high cards to avoid getting boxed. Great way to empty the opponents hand early in the turn, especially if your DM has Fast from being near undead. Just 3 bury attempts and watch your opponent freak out!

[trikk]

TBH with 3 bury attempts I'd give up after the first one unless I have Sz 3+

[Cronex13]

Keep in mind its a fairly specific tactic where the point isn't actually to bury the enemy, it's to dick with your opponent. You do it early in the round, 1st activation preferably. They don't want to potentially lose an activation so they dump cards into preventing him being buried in the first place. Obviously the smart move would be to allow the dude to be buried and save a card for passing the TN13 Wp duel required to escape, but oftentimes people are just intimidated by the box and will dump their hands to avoid it

[4thstringer]

3 minutes ago, Cronex13 said:

Keep in mind its a fairly specific tactic where the point isn't actually to bury the enemy, it's to dick with your opponent. You do it early in the round, 1st activation preferably. They don't want to potentially lose an activation so they dump cards into preventing him being buried in the first place. Obviously the smart move would be to allow the dude to be buried and save a card for passing the TN13 Wp duel required to escape, but oftentimes people are just intimidated by the box and will dump their hands to avoid it

Its really just a bad play tax.  If your opponent is bad/has ptsd from being boxed last edition you might get them to throw cards at it.  If they are an opponent that might actually be a challenge to play against, they won't.   Unless they are incorp or armored, I would much rather swing a sword at them multiple times..

 

[solkan]

I think Death Marshal Recruiters also sort of tie in to the 'buy models to get them out of your way' mechanic.  If there was a good way of getting them rams on their Pine Box attack...

Agent 46 as a 10SS hire to get off a 6 v Sz Pine Box attack is something to consider.

[4thstringer]

1 minute ago, solkan said:

I think Death Marshal Recruiters also sort of tie in to the 'buy models to get them out of your way' mechanic.  If there was a good way of getting them rams on their Pine Box attack...

Agent 46 as a 10SS hire to get off a 6 v Sz Pine Box attack is something to consider.

I played a game where I used 2 death marshals, doppel and agent, and was going to just box everyone.  My opponent took out the death marshalls asap, after I buried like 4 models in the turn.  The list really wasn't very successful tbh, but did get me a mediocre win.  The reach of 0 on the box is a real problem.

[Cronex13]

4th stringer you're not wrong there, a smart opponent isn't gonna fall for it (though to be fair, basically everyone in my group has PTSD from last edition, I used my DMs well!) 

[le_wahou]

If the range was not 0", boxing would allow DM to disengage easily and scheme. It would make them slow but very durable scheme runners. Without this, I do not see how i can use them effectively. They may be durable front liner, but their team do not really need them. With other masters, 6 points is expensive for other teams.

[4thstringer]

I'm not sure if I agree about how durable they are.  Their def is garbage, and even with htw and htk, they go down easily (like a 5 point model should).  Given all the incidental damage that exists in this edition, the HTK is less valuable than ever.  Their potential to be a fast gunline model is about all I see of value in them.

[Cronex13]

I had the same problem with guard last edition as far as incidental damage went - blasts, black blood, etc was an issue. Truth be told though, I feel that decent positioning can help with this - in the thick of it but maybe just far enough away from other models to avoid blasts. That said, I wouldn't say they're overly durable, I'd say they're durable by the standards of a 5 point model. Consider that on average, it'll probably take more than 2 ap to kill them (assuming whatever attacks them gets minimum damage because of NegFlips and then Hard to Kill.) For a 5 point model it's good. I probably wouldn't bring them outside of Lady J because 6 points isn't great imo but I feel like they're good for the 5 points you spend. That said, I don't see them doing much against non minions themselves. Occasionally could get a box on an Enforcer or henchmen but I feel like they're doing their best when they're holding something in place to keep it away from Lady J or keeping them in place until she gets there. I feel like they're not meant to kill, just to tarpit. And for 5 points they do a decent job

[Cronex13]

To add to my previous comment, keep in mind that there are a lot of easy ways to heal them! They can slightly heal when they bury someone, and this could restart HtK. Additionally, Corpse Tamers can heal them with Decay easily. That's just off the top of my head

[ShinChan]

30 minutes ago, 4thstringer said:

I'm not sure if I agree about how durable they are.  Their def is garbage, and even with htw and htk, they go down easily (like a 5 point model should).  Given all the incidental damage that exists in this edition, the HTK is less valuable than ever.  Their potential to be a fast gunline model is about all I see of value in them.

Hard to Kill + HtW + easy access to healing + end condition by discarding one card. That's definitely not easy to kill, specially for a model that costs 5ss. And that's only in their card.

I'm not totally sold with the recruiters tho, since your enemy won't be leaving any corpse markers and the aura size is quite small... Maybe with an upgrade (they do more damage shooting than in CC), they could be a decent shooter.

The ones that can convert people into Undead are:

• The Jury: False accusation:  range 8" against Wp with Stat 5
• Exorcists: False accusation: Two nice triggers, one forces the opponent to discard a card or suffer 3 damage and the other one allows you to take the action again.
• Domadores de cadáveres: All living models in 5" and LoS become Undead and lose living. This will be a problem when you face stuff like Dreamer and his nightmares, but is really good if the enemy bring Living stuff.

 

[Hot4Perdita]

Doesn’t Pine Box cause you to lose an activation if you haven’t activated yet? Or am I thinking of 2e?

[Cathaidan]

As far as actually using the pine boxes go, I find that it is a nice little "gotcha" moment in my games.  It isn't a strategy to rely on, and it can backfire.  However, in games against very mobile opponents who are going to be jumping around to avoid Lady J and the Judge, sometimes it is worth it to drop that severe to box a model.  (In my first ever game of Mailfaux during the Beta, my opponent was doing everything he could to keep Lady J from jumping onto high value targets; burying Bette Noir when she got smacked and constantly jumping Seamus in to shoot and jumping him back out.  Having a DM box him after the jump meant a free hit on Bette from the trigger, and Seamus was already boxed when Jury activated.  Sure, he popped out again, but stacking 3 dmg onto Bette and 2 onto Seamus out of 1 AP and activating another model was all kinds of efficient.)

I haven't managed to get the DMR to use Grim Recruitment yet, but I still suck at utilizing everything that I bring.  Being able to attack buried models is very good against some crews and not others.  (Looking at you, Dreamer and Tara crews!)  The other thing that I have considered trying to do is kind of a "Grab and Go" strategy with this crew.  Have a DM charge an enemy model and box it, only to then walk back into a group of awaiting friendly models (Thinking of a Dom, a DMR, and anything else.)  All of the free movement/utility for me dragging something within the Dom's auto undead aura and isolating that piece from its own crew seems strong.  Especially if you were to use the Dom to obey the DM on the charge, so the DM can have more actions free.

The other thing to consider is that a DMR is only 3 stones more than a DM, and while it loses HtK, all of its stats are better across the board.  It is better at boxing, shooting, melee, Df, can attack buried models, and can give free movement.  8 stones is a lot, but you do get some nice stuff for the investment.

When it comes to the Lone Marshal, I get why people want him to have Ride with Me, but I think he's solid as he is.  In every game I've taken him in, I can just send him on his merry way down a table edge and he has more than enough to take out any enemy scheme runners facing him and then dropping scheme markers for me.  The only thing he seems to struggle against is Butterfly Jump, but that's because each time he hits the target, it gets to move farther and farther away from him.  Sure, he's got the mobility to catch it again, but sometimes the goal is to kill the Wandering River Monk, not to let it move past you to scheme in your backfield outside of its activation.