Short Guide to Outcast Crews

[Zebo]

It would be cool to make a short guide of the crews and their playstyle, only for the purpose of helping the new players to know our crews.

I'm absolutely not a great player, and only have played 4 crews (and only one with more than 10 games), so it would be great to have the help of anybody who wants. I'll be editing this first post to add any suggestions and to correct my mistakes.

 

AMALGAM

They are the epitome of the creations of an Evil Genius Steampunk Necromacer. Half-flesh-half-machine nightmares that lacks any emotion but suffering and advances relentless while begging for being killed (at least that's how I imagine the Abominations and the Desolation Engine).

Amalgam plays a kind of attrition war. They may not be the tougher creatures on the battlefield, but can take some hits and have many ways to heal themselves (while damaging their foes), and their enemies suffer damage not only when attacked, but also when attacking and even only with being near them. They can even turn their enemies into more Abominations.

They are not the fastest crew, but have some resources to add movement to the crew.

The Master is a kind of strange beater. He can fight both in melee or ranged, and while his damage is the worst of any "killy master", it's irreducible and he can hurt himself to improve a little his damage output. He can also resurrect when killed, sacrificing his totems in the process while teleporting just by their side, so you need to be careful while moving and placing them, to not let your opponent to kill them, but neither place them when your master is gonna be isolated if resurrect in them.

 

This crew can suffer when facing mobile crews, specially if the opposite crew plays evasive and keeps themselves away from your models and don't attack you. Leveticus is quite dependent on auto-damaging to be effective, and if the Hollow Waifs are taken down, he becomes quite vulnerable. 

Also, if the enemy keeps away, it's immune to Entropy, if they don't attack you, they're immune to Unmade.

 

BANDIT

Basically, far west outlaws.

The Bandits relies on their mobility and shooting (lots of shots) to win the edge. They can take advantage of the enemy resources, mostly the enemy scheme markers, but also can steal cards and sometimes soulstones from their foes.

They don't have ways to ignore terrain, but they can gain Fast easily, and have TONS of pushes and extra moves, so they are really mobile and can out-run many crews (and do it while shooting).

Their main mechanic is to eat scheme markers to become Fast, what makes them very powerful. And they have many ways to drop both friendly and enemy scheme markers, but none of the ways is automatic or uncosted, so they are funny to play.

The Master is mostly a support piece. He can shoot, but his shots are not so damaging and helps his crew by dropping scheme markers that can be used by his mates. He can also drain the opponent's hand and replenishing his own, steal ss from the enemy and even collect enemy scheme markers into ss.

 

Bandits need to being dropping markers to keep their game hot. If they run out of ss and tomes they're quite weaker.

They're also not very tough, so even if they can shoot when engaged, better keep them away of close combat or they will fall down quickly (unless the Wokou Raiders, which are the Bandits melee tarpits).

 

FREIKORPS

Pseudo WW I Steampunk German soldiers with metal plates and alchemical masks.

Freikorps are a ranged crew with above-average toughness. The crew has many blasts and shockwave attacks, a pair of strong melee beaters, some heals, advanced-deployed models and a pair of tricks under their hats that makes them quite versatile for every circumstance.

They are quite self-sufficient, and usually they don't benefit from their friend's actions and don't have many shenanigans. Their play is to have the Master and the Totem giving special weapons and equipment to the crew to improve their play.

The Master is a pure support piece. His attacks are not worth the action(WARNING: this can be a little overreaction), while he can give his troops some special weapons or equipment at the same time that pushes them around. He is tough and mobile, although. 

The Freikorps can do well many things, but they can't do everything well at the same time. They need resources to boost each side of their play, maybe card cheating/discarding or spending ss. If they face crews with resource control, they can be severely affected. 

 

INFAMOUS

Well, the best way to describe this crew is… flying gremlin pirates mixed with Mexican-wrestlers style gremlins.

The main trick of this crew is to drop pianos from their flying ship, in form of piano markers to limit their foes movement. The flying pirates can ignore them and the wrestlers can use them to knock their target's heads.

Absolutely no idea of what this means in the table, need help from experts. 

The Master is a kind of super fast flying model that can drop markers and enemies around. No idea his strengths and weaknesses. 

 

MERCENARY

The Mercenary keyword consists in a bunch of human fighters (mostly females) fighting together. They really doesn't seem very unified by their looking.

The mercenaries are basically fast melee beaters. They move a lot, and they kill a lot in close combat. Everyone may have a different trick, but overall what they do is to move and to kill with swords/hammers/fists/whatever. They have a pair of support pieces that may buff them, heal them or provide an extremely weak shot at long range. Their only obvious shenanigan is to have one mercenary near each Viktoria to benefit from their master's extra attack trigger (if you don't want to have both Viktorias together, which is the most killy thing you can do).

The Master is a killy fragile melee beater, who fights side by side with her twin (instead of totem, this crew has like two weaker masters).

 

OBLITERATION

The looking of this crew is like a bunch of ethereal out-of-space monsters, guided by a few humans. 

This is officially the summoning crew of the outcasts. The Obliteration crew are the masters of burying. All of them can bury enemies. All of them can attack or damage buried enemies. They can also bury their allies to gain some advantages.

They also has shenanigans with the Fast and Slow conditions, specially with enemies with the Fast condition, but I've not played them and cannot give any advice about their playstyle.

They use to deal with enemy models by burying them and then proceed to attack the buried model with every model you wish, since them can attack buried models. Your opponent can let you kill his/her model or activate it and let you redeploy it in the worst place you can (always in base contact with another enemy model), so you can isolate the beaters, or put the squishy/utility/target of schemes models in the middle of the heat.

There's some models that make extra damage to fast enemy models, there's some model with positive flips versus fast enemies, and some models that do automatic damage to enemy fast models that start their activation near them. But every single model can unbury near models with Fast, what makes enemies with Fast really useful to this crew (and almost everyone here can put Fast on enemy models).

The key is to dominate the tempo,  to bury already activated models, or not give away fast to enemy models that can take advantage of it before you. Obliteration can disrupt a lot your enemy's plans. 

They are also quite resilient, with quite Terrifying, Incorporeal and Armor (and can be buried and healed when damaged). But this defenses can be avoided by indirect damage like shockwaves, pulses or terrain traits.

The Master is a kind of weird summoner, since her summoning is not her main strength, and can do some tricks (well, since I've not played her, I don't know how she plays).

 

PLAGUE

Like the Pied Piper of Hamelin, the crew consists basically of rats and childs.

The Plague crew has two themes, to summon rats and to spread the Blight. The rat engine depends on a trigger in Hamelin's melee attack (you don't want Hamelin engaged), the Rat Catcher's melee attack and the Obedient Wretch ranged attack, all of them unsuited and only applied when succeeding with an attack to an enemy model. Also can summon rats when models with Blight dies near Hamelin or the Rat Catcher, or when the Stolen or Obedient Wretch dies. The last way is an action from Benny Wolcomb that needs as much schemes markers as possible. All of this is quite situational, hard to achieve or simply not worth the effort only to summon Rats.

So the key for this crew is to spread blight quickly and to exploit it to finish the enemy. The best source is Hamelin's Lure, but only being near any non-Rat non-Rat Catcher is gonna spread it, and many melee attacks can increase the Blight tokens really fast.

The Master is hard to kill thanks to his meatshield child's, and likes to spread the plague and then kill the infected models. He can do a ton of damage, but needs some set out first.

 

This crew treats many of is models as resources (specially the Rats) but is quite vulnerable to area damage, that forces them to spread maybe to much for their playstyle.

 

TORMENTED

The impersonation of suffering and madness. This crew remember me the ghosts from the movie "House on Haunted Hill", but less incorporeal.

This crew seems to rely on draining your opponent's hand while replenishing your own. The Master and some models can attach upgrades to the enemy, and the crew draw cards every time they damage enemies with upgrades. The Master is almost unkillable as long as you have cards in hand, and he can heal himself each time you must draw cards, so more shenanigans here. 

They also benefit from the enemies having the Staggered condition, and they have many ways to apply it.

That said, I have no idea about the way of play the crew. It seems fun but not easy, and I think they tends to buble, but need some Tormented player to explain better their playstyle.

About the Master, he can do a lot of damage to staggered models, but he has no way to stagger models during his activation. He can reliable attach upgrades to enemies and benefit from them, so he can start the turn and curse enemies to boost his crew, or wait until there's some staggered models and then punish them.

No idea the best way to use him, sorry.

One of the keys for this crew is to manage correctly their hand, since can be quite card-hungre and Daw's survivability relies on having cards in your hand. 

 

Again, this thread would be really helpful to newbies if the veterans helps to add/correct the information.

[ShinChan]

It's a really nice idea, but that green color is awful and difficult to read. In addition I would make use of some bold and italic text as well as bullet points

 

[Toqtamish]

Wow that hurts the eyes. 

[Zebo]

Yeah, sorry. Don't know how to fix it.

I wrote all first on a word document in my mobile phone, an when pasted it here, it was like black over black, so I changed it to a colour that could be viewed both in black and white pages.

Not sure how to change it.

[Toqtamish]

That's better. 

[Grooty]

Hey guys !

As a freshly new european player, I'm really enjoyed by this kind of topic ! Thanks a lot for the work done, and what's coming next ! :D

[Sol_Sorrowsong]

For Parker's crew (Bandits) I would say they ARE quite mobile in that they have easy access to Fast and can gain movement while using their ranged attack.  Yes, not every model gets to go fast, but easily you can have 2 models with fast every turn (easier still with Emissary giving 3" push and marker). A bandido then gets 15" of movement and a 12" shot!  I'd also put a mention out for Mad dog who has blasts, built in armor piercing trigger, and of course can blow cover to hell.  

 

For Tara (Obliteration), Incorporeal as a protection against attacks. Her summons come in buried but can unbury next to a Fast model. She herself can activate twice, giving her 3 actions and then 2 actions. Lots of Terrifying and WP duels/attacks with this crew.

[Zebo]

Thanks, I forgot the many pushes and extra moves that Bandits can display. 

But about the Obliteration, I know the rules but Not really at all the utility and modus operandi. They kill, runs, tank, disrupts...?

[ShinChan]

31 minutes ago, Zebo said:

Thanks, I forgot the many pushes and extra moves that Bandits can display. 

But about the Obliteration, I know the rules but Not really at all the utility and modus operandi. They kill, runs, tank, disrupts...?

They're great at scheme running, especially Tara and the Void Wretches. They can disrupt you with Glimpse of the Void and they have 2 big beaters: The Nothing Beast and Talos. The second one is reaaally slow.

[Sol_Sorrowsong]

Enemy can unbury on their turn but is placed B2B with a friendly model (Tara player chooses), so their big beaters can get teleported behind the support player who may have already gone.  It's on activating too, so not knowing where you'll be placed, and then needing to make something of the model's turn can be really difficult.  Usually at least one action will be just to get in better position.

[Zebo]

Just curious.

Anybody agree with my comparison between Tormented and House of Haunted Hill?

That was my first impression with them.

[Sol_Sorrowsong]

6 minutes ago, Zebo said:

Just curious.

Anybody agree with my comparison between Tormented and House of Haunted Hill?

That was my first impression with them.

I don't know the reference sorry, but reading back through, I thought it might also be useful to add a small portion about challenges each crew might have. Specifically for Daw, I believe he uses cards very quickly and can suffer from having a small hand quickly if not careful.  For Parker, he likes to have several soulstones in hand to get things flowing or his cycling of cards and soulstones from the enemy can grind to a halt. Mad dog is great within 8" of something, but can struggle in melee if he can't get the right trigger or someone has greater reach. Tara crew is strong to attacks, but weak to damage from effects not directly from the attack (ex. Enemy models in pulse 2" take a TN 14 WP duel or suffer 2 damage).

[Zebo]

I can do it with the crews I know the most, but need help with the others.

Never thought Obliteration crew were specially tough, not versus attacks neither to other effects.

[Sol_Sorrowsong]

6 minutes ago, Zebo said:

I can do it with the crews I know the most, but need help with the others.

Never thought Obliteration crew were specially tough, not versus attacks neither to other effects.

Talos, Nothing Beast, Void Hunter are all terrifying. Talos has armor +2 and the others are incorporeal. NB is df/wp 6/6. Aionus is 6/7.  They aren't tanks, but they don't go down so easily. I find the terrifying the biggest advantage because even though it is TN10 or 11 it usually requires a 5-6 to beat and although it isn't high, a forced flip that you might need to cheat, just to be able to attempt the attack can be really discouraging.  My last game vs Tara, I was all set with a high card in hand to get in a great attack, but then failed the TN duel and had nothing better but to waste that great card just to attempt the attack.  Then I flipped low again and lost a card for nothing.  It isn't the best, but it is everytime and that adds up.

[Zebo]

An that's why it's cool to have other players giving advice.

I've never played with Obliteration or faced them, so not realized they can be hard to take down.

[Rob Lo]

Being able to bury a friendly model that's in danger, heal it up, and later have it pop out anywhere on the board you can get a fast (out of danger, threatening a target, dropping a scheme) is potentially incredibly powerful.

[Zebo]

Thanks. Edited to add what seems to be the main weaknesses an challenges of each crew. 

[Micawber]

The Obliteration crew is not that resilient in a vacuum. Even with Incorporeal and Terrifying on some models they overall lack the raw hitpoints, Shielded, defensive triggers, armor or other defensive tech to make them truly tough. That said if they're played to their strength as a denial crew they become nigh unkillable if the opponent is unable to nuke them in one activation.
Not to mention that if you really wanted to and played your stutter time chain right the opponent would've nothing to attack anyways except for a Void Wretch. Everything else would be buried or hidden in the deployment zone.

Quote

They are quite self-sufficient, and usually they don't benefit from their friend's actions and don't have many shenanigans. Their play is to have the Master and the Totem giving special weapons and equipment to the crew to improve their play.

I also think this paragraph sends the wrong message. Yes, while they can operate just fine on their own that is NOT playing to their true strength. Freikorps are probably one of, if not THE most interactive crew that I'm playing. Between all the lil pushes, places, copy actions, upgrades, equipments actions, healing bursts and buffs it get's really intense how to sequence your activations. Anyways - point is even if this guide aims for beginners I think it's wrong to only point them towards the skill-floor of a specific crew.

Thing is before going into too much details we should probably establish how expansive this "short guide" is allowed to be. Since there are not yet tacticas to the M3 crews anywhere on the interwebz the official forum would be a fitting place to start establishing those. That would obviously go far beyond the constraints of a "short guide".

[Zebo]

I'm trying not to enter into individual models capabilities, or specific interactions or tactics.

 

Also, when I speak about interactions and shenanigans I mean things like all Bandits benefit from scheme markers, specially enemy scheme markers, and almost any Bandit can drop them. Or Tormented models spreading Staggered or Cursed Upgrades for other Tormented to benefit, or some Obliteration models providing Fast or Burying enemy models to improve the rest of the crew, or some Plague models spreading Blight and others exploiting it...

Yes, Librarians can heal allies and push them, and the Engineers protects other models... and that's all. Freikorpsmann can't do anything for their folks, Scouts activations has no benefits for their mates, Specialists can end some Conditions, and that's all...

Freikorps has not an specific mechanic

[$UpAhOTTÿ_69]

I really like the idea of having some short guides! This is honestly a topic I think is really useful, but I found the formatting a bit weird and it was kinda unfocused. Something quick a dirty I threw together as format could be something like this:

 

Keyword: The Keyword being talked about.

Signature ability: The common ability between all the models. Run and Gun for Bandit, Torment for Tormented, etc.

Master Rundown: A brief explanation on how the master works/is supposed to be used.

Crew Rundown: How the crew supports the master.

Strong in (type in specific strategies here)

Weak in (type specific strategies here)

Advantage against (specific Faction/s)

Disadvantage against (specific Faction/s)

 

I think talking about what the Master does is important to the crew, as they are typically the lynchpin of how the crew works - seeing as either the Master supports the crew or the crew supports the Master in some way. For example:

 

"Cowboys in the Weird West"

Keyword: Bandit.

Signature Ability: Run and Gun - shoot on a Charge.

Master Rundown: Parker Barrows is a charismatic leader of Bandits - he tells them where to shoot, where to run, and what to interact with using his Abilities and Actions. His guns set up for a lot of this, with damaging enemies allowing models within LOS to interact at the cost of a card, as well as triggers to drop enemy scheme markers allowing him to direct his gang to move onto that area and shoot. He also converts the opponents resources (soulstones, cards and scheme markers) into Soulstones or cards for his gang through other Actions.

Crew Rundown: Most of the Barrows gang have the Run and Gun Ability or an Ability that benefits their Charge, allowing them to maneuver around and set up for Strats and Schemes all while throwing attacks around. Most have an ability to eat scheme markers to gain Fast at the beginning of activation, which makes use of Parker's (and the rest of the gang's) shooting, dropping markers, then pushing them up to them. This incredible maneuverability comes at the cost of having very average defense, so be careful about positioning and letting them into close combat.

Strong in ...  (I haven't actually given them enough testing lol)

Weak in (See above comment)

Advantage against 

Disadvantage against

 

What do people think?

[Zebo]

I'm not sure in being so specific in organizing the information.

I mean, I'm already speaking about the specific function/gameplay of the Master inside it's crew, along with the crew's playstyle, overall shenanigans, strong and weak points.

But there's not always one signature ability. Some crews can have more than one (Amalgam has Entropy and Unmade), some crews has none (Freikorps) and some relies almost more on actions (Obliteration's Sutter Time) or triggers (Obliteration Glimpse the Void or Bandit Drop It).

It's information that should not be skipped, but would make each entry huge. I want to avoid to explain rules to keep the guide short.

That said, it's still far from being finished. The most I know is about the Freikorps, and sure there's people that can explain them better than me.

I've played Mercenaries and still am lost about them. Same with Amalgam and Bandit (I want to avoid as much as possible theoryfaux).

With Plague, Tormented and Obliteration, the few I understand from their rules (here I'm falling in theoryfaux because I have no real experience) and your help.

And with Infamous I literally have no f*king idea what I'm talking about xDD

Please S.O.S

[Jesy Blue]

1 hour ago, Zebo said:

And with Infamous I literally have no f*king idea what I'm talking about.

Man, ain't nobody knows that the Infamous are about... they just keep dropping pianos on folks!

[Micawber]

On 9/21/2019 at 1:56 PM, $UpAhOTTÿ_69 said:

What do people think?

I gave it a try. The leader description is copypasta from the official page as a stand-in.

----------

Von Schill

Keyword: Freikorp

Signature ability: armor, equipment upgrades

Master Rundown: The leader of the hardened Freikorps mercenary group has spent his time between editions restocking on weapons. In addition to being a fierce combatant, Von Schill is also capable of handing out Equipment Upgrades to his followers, granting them access to powerful rocket launchers, hidden mines, and other deadly weapons. 

Crew Rundown: The Freikorps, still provide some of the most versatile playstyles, easily adapting to any situation on the fly, while sticking to their hardened playstyle with incredibly durable models and characters.

Strong in: Turf War and Reckoning because of their incredible toughness, mutual support and healing capabilities it is a real challenge to kill any of the Freikorp models.

Weak in: None really. The are extremely adaptable and therefore have no glaring weaknesses when it comes to strategies. Some more movement or interact-heavy schemes can cause them problems though.

Advantage against: Crews without easy access to anti-armor/shielded or a way to work around it. Also against alpha-strike dependent crews since it is nigh impossible to kill most of the Freikorp core models in one round without the deck beeing stacked heavily against the Freikorp player.

Disadvantage against: Crews with a lot of AOE since it heavily discourages bubbles which in turn negates a lot of the Freikorps mutual support abilities. Crews with a heavy hand-control theme or that starve a Freikorp player for cards. Also crews with the ability to manipulate the Freikorp models directly with lures and obeys or other ways to disrupt all the little interactions and setups a Freikorp crew likes to do.

----------

[Micawber]

26 minutes ago, Jesy Blue said:

Man, ain't nobody knows that the Infamous are about... they just keep dropping pianos on folks!

They are just very confused roadies for a travelling orchestra with expansive piano section. Obviously.

[$UpAhOTTÿ_69]

On 9/22/2019 at 6:57 AM, Zebo said:

I'm not sure in being so specific in organizing the information.

I mean, I'm already speaking about the specific function/gameplay of the Master inside it's crew, along with the crew's playstyle, overall shenanigans, strong and weak points.

But there's not always one signature ability. Some crews can have more than one (Amalgam has Entropy and Unmade), some crews has none (Freikorps) and some relies almost more on actions (Obliteration's Sutter Time) or triggers (Obliteration Glimpse the Void or Bandit Drop It).

It's information that should not be skipped, but would make each entry huge. I want to avoid to explain rules to keep the guide short.

I think that being more specific helps people to understand what they need to keep an eye out for when thinking about using or going against the Keyword. That's a really good point on the abilities thing - it's probably better to change it to Signature Abilities + Actions. The main reason for giving it a format is to make it easier for people to give input and consolidate info about certain things about a Keyword.

I don't think you need to go heavily in depth on each mechanic, but actually talking about what they're called helps new players from having to search around on the cards to figure out what everything means.

Looking over it, I'm pretty sure the Freikorps are one of the few exceptions to the rule of common Keyword synergy since the only think keeping them together is a few actions (Load up, Rummage through the Trunk, Adaptive Tactics) which probably is enough synergy anyway. 

 

On 9/19/2019 at 1:10 AM, Sol_Sorrowsong said:

Enemy can unbury on their turn but is placed B2B with a friendly model (Tara player chooses), so their big beaters can get teleported behind the support player who may have already gone.  It's on activating too, so not knowing where you'll be placed, and then needing to make something of the model's turn can be really difficult.  Usually at least one action will be just to get in better position.

Correction on the unbury, it's within 1'' of an enemy model (from Tara's perspective). Base contact is for Tara's models when removing Fast from models to unbury.