Seamus - "Why Hello, Love" utility ?

[Inryhk]

Hey,

I'am trying to learn Seamus and his crew but no one I know uses or played againts 3E Seamus so I can't get a straight answer. The wording on his Ability "Why Hello, Love" is pretty confusing to me because by my understanding it is either very powerful or very situational.

"Why Hello,Love" states: After an enemy model ends a move engaged by this model, if it is not the enemy model's Activation, this model may take a melee Action targeting it.

So what is confusing to me is that by my understanding Seamus only really have 2 ways of moving enemy model. By Terrorize or by Flintlock's Trigger Daze. But in Terrorize's case it is impossible to be in range to perform melee attack with 1" range Bag of Tools, and in Flintlock's case since Daze is a Trigger and the movement is just 3" it is extremely situational or needs to be set up properly and cheated with this in mind.

I was wondering if this meant that I could just do melee Action regardless of the range on Bag of Tools but this on the other hand makes this seem very powerful since both Terrorize and Flintlock are very strong actions on their own and adding Bag of Tools on top of that every time you move enemy model sounds ridiculous.

 

So I decided to ask you, did I just misunderstood how the ability works ? How do you utilize or seen others utilize this ability ? Are there any crew setups or synergies that may help with using it ? Having more chances for Bag of Tools Triggers seem like a very strong tool.

[CD1248]

It requires the enemy model to end Engaged with Seamus, so within 1" of him. He personally doesn't have many ways to force it (just the trigger on Flintlock, realistically) but his crew does.

Doxies, Belles, and Madame Sybelle all have ways to move enemy models, and it also provides a deterrent against opponents that might want to use movement tricks to engage him out of their activations. 

Dead Rider can yank enemies a significant distance too, might be a good synergy.

[Fetid Strumpet]

Seamus has been my main master since 1e so I’ll happily offer my opinion, but keep in mind though it is a very informed opinion, it’s just an opinion.

It’s a situationally powerful ability. The most common way to trigger it would be to leave Seamus in a cluster of Rotten Belles, Doxies, or Sybelle and use their Lure, Take by the Hand, and or beckoning call to move An enemy so it ends in melee range of Seamus, triggering the free attack.

I don’t tend to favor this method of usage, not the Least because I regard the vast majority of the Red Chapel models total garbage that actively hurt your chances of winning if you hire them. I find in general there are a few situational uses for the some of the Red Chapel models, but in general you should try to hire as few of them as possible in a competitive Red Chapel crew.

The other reason I don’t favor this method is because you are giving up on Seamus’ most powerful ability to use it, mobility. You have to cluster up to use it in this way and I tend to find opportunistic clustering is the only really good clustering in 3E. Relying on it as a main game plan has been pretty bad in my experience do to all the pulses, auras, shockwaves, and blasts that permeate most crews.

@thewrathchilde gave me the best suggestion for using it which is to use, as you mentioned, the Daze trigger off the gun to trigger it. Again in general it shouldn’t be your main game plan, but it can be a pretty powerful ability to help take down those models you must kill or getting past a hard to kill ability on some model you’ve targeted with his gun.

[solkan]

Rotten Belles:

• Have Lure, which will set off their own Pounce ability (gain Fast), and set off Seamus's ability
• The "Pulled Here and There" can push the target, setting off abilities again
• If in range of Madame Sybelle, gains Focused +1 as well.

Seamus:

• Terrorize sets off Rotten Belle's Pounce, and boxed in could set off his own ability.

Madame Sybelly

• Beckoning Call sets off Rotten Belle's Pounce, and Seamus's ablity.
• Bump in the Night means that all of the minions (whether they have other abilities or not) gain Focused if you moved someone around outside of their activation and that someone is engaged by that minion.

Dead Doxy

• Take By The Hand can set off those same abilities, but it's shorter range

Bete Noir

• Has Pounce, which can be set off by everyone else's movement stuff.

That's just the Redchapel keyword.  Like CD1248, this is the sort of thing that also discourages the other crew using abilities that move their own models around outside of activation.  Very importantly, remember that in this edition, Place, Push and Move are all movement, and a 0" move still counts.

Pounce may not be as dramatic now as it was in M2E (when Pounce meant you got to attack immediately), but pushing around an enemy model and building up a bunch of free Focused, with the occasional attack from Seamus...

 

[Inryhk]

Heh, since the word "engaged" had no capital letter I assumed they meant the movement was engaged by this model and not the Engaged rule. But really looking at Redchapel Keyword models it makes so much more sense this way . Thank you all for the replies and advices on synergies.

[Regelridderen]

Dreamer has a hard time, when he is without high mask cards, so he is dependent on stoning/cheating to get the right suits. So put the pressure on him, and do so before T3-4, where his deck is getting trimmed. 

[Maniacal_cackle]

Overtime, you get better at spotting opportunities to do things that require setup like this.

For instance, another random way it might align is that another model positions within 4" of you (or is even engaging you).

Archie could leap behind them, charge, cheat for suit, and use the trigger to push them into you. 3 attacks from Archie and 1 free one from Seamus = one dead enemy.

You don't have to try to set it up. Just learn these tricks that allow you to do it for specific cases. Takes loads of practice!

[Maniacal_cackle]

39 minutes ago, Regelridderen said:

Dreamer has a hard time, when he is without high mask cards, so he is dependent on stoning/cheating to get the right suits. So put the pressure on him, and do so before T3-4, where his deck is getting trimmed. 

Wrong thread, I think?

[thewrathchilde]

@Fetid Strumpet hit the nail on the head. It is a situationally amazing ability. I get great mileage out of it, and like him, field a 50% non-Redchapel crew the majority of the time with Seamus. 
 

Typically I run 2 x Doxies and a Nurse in my lists which gives me some movement shenanigans in addition to the other things those models do. When you get enough games in with him that you can start forecasting where/when he is going to be you can start setting up situations that let you capitalize off of Why Hello Love without compromising your decision process just to get the extra attacks. 
 

The trap is some players make the wrong decisions (activation order, resources, target priorities) to get the extra attacks when other decisions were more appropriate for the situation. 
 

I tend to play Redchapel really aggressively when the match allows and often have turns and activation where Seamus is triggering Why Hello Love multiple times in his activation and in the turn on some early turns and then that’s usually game......you just have to balance your decisions and evaluate the risks to make sure your aren’t compromising the game over an extra attack. 

[Fetid Strumpet]

Doxies, Dandies, and very rarely Bete tend to be my only Red Chapel hires myself. Although I’m hiring Doxies less myself lately. Too many TN in the same crew...

Toshiro has been a frequent hire lately as well for his foul mouthed Motivation. He’s a vastly better Sybelle than Sybelle is.

[Granty1982]

Why hello love is a trap for Seamus. He dies far too easily and should never be close enough to enemy for it to happen. Seamus imo plays independently from his crew following a simple cycle. Focus, teleport, shoot, teleport. A potential 2nd shot is very situational and I'd rather 1 focused shot rather than 2 without. That being said, copycat is your 'get out of shit free card' for 2 shots, 1 with focus. Generally by turn 4 Seamus has done enough damage to just scheme if need be and with a potential of 48 inches of movement in 1 turn most schemes are pretty simple.

[Fetid Strumpet]

I would disagree with the above statement, personally.

[farmoar]

18 hours ago, Fetid Strumpet said:

I would disagree with the above statement, personally.

Please go on. As someone who has always loved Seamus, but not the rest of the crew, I am looking for more insight from you guys, before diving in and buying single models for him. These threads have been great, as far as list building go. Thank you all!

[thewrathchilde]

5 hours ago, farmoar said:

Please go on. As someone who has always loved Seamus, but not the rest of the crew, I am looking for more insight from you guys, before diving in and buying single models for him. These threads have been great, as far as list building go. Thank you all!

i think we have discussed this in a couple of different threads.

 

There are other tools to put focus on Seamus to allow him to be way more efficient and effective with his actions over spending 2 actions a turn focusing. Additionally there are so many tools he has available with his own triggers and other models in the crew to enable him to get additional attacks from Why Hello Love without significantly overexposing him or compromising his survivability. Take a look at some of the other Seamus discussion where @Fetid Strumpet and I (and others) have talked about it more in depth; if you still have questions come back then with more specific questions. 

[Deathinabox]

I find there to be a lot of synergy between the Dead Rider and Seamus. DR uses his reap trigger to place the target near Seamus, then Seamus swings in with his bag. Repeat as needed

[SoulGambit]

I've used Nurses with Seamus before. Among other things, their Melee attack has a built in Daze, which pushes a model 3".

[Granty1982]

On 10/22/2019 at 3:02 AM, Fetid Strumpet said:

I would disagree with the above statement, personally.

I would disagree with your disagreement of my statement, personally 😉 x

[Fetid Strumpet]

That’s fine. It’s a perfectly valid opinion to have.

However, I have 75+ games under my belt with Seamus so I’m comfortable with my opinion being informed. And by the fact I’ve not lost Seamus once in all those games, and once I figured out how to use it, the fact that I’ve used Hello love pretty regularly over the past few months. So I don’t find it puts him in any real danger.

I’m pretty comfortable saying “Hello Love” is not a trap, and that while you certainly can use Seamus as you describe above it isn’t the necessarily the best way to use him. But you are certainly entitled to your opinion, which is informed by your experience. Valid as it is I, personally, would regard that as first level Seamus expertise as my opinion was pretty similar to yours for the first 25 to 30 games with him.

It took me awhile to reassess my opinion on most of his abilities.

[thewrathchilde]

On 10/23/2019 at 4:09 PM, Fetid Strumpet said:

I’m pretty comfortable saying “Hello Love” is not a trap,

I agree. Like anything else you have to look at the 2nd and 3rd order affects of the decision. It isn’t a trap but to position him where he can most aggressively use it isn’t always the best choice.

But he can often be used safety in a way that enables you to get mileage out of Why Hello Love and when he does you get significantly more mileage out of him and the crew. Additional attacks on key turns can greatly enhance the effectiveness of the crew- especially when they are incidental to other things the crew is going to do. 

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and that while you certainly can use Seamus as you describe above

Yep, and that’s what we want all the other Seamus players to do so people don’t expect the aggressive positioning and use of Why Hello Love to turn Seamus into a true murder machine. 

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I, personally, would regard that as first level Seamus expertise

Sh........

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as my opinion was pretty similar to yours for the first 25 to 30 games with him.

It took me awhile to reassess my opinion on most of his abilities.

What caused you to reassess? A lot of time and players get stuck in a rut. 

[Da Git]

@Fetid Strumpet if you don't use Belles or Sybelle, what models are you using using to push the enemy to trigger Why, hello luv! Just Doxies? The Daze trigger on Seamus' gun?

OOK or versatile models? 

[Graf]

Seems like Seamus needs a pinned guide thread a lot 😅.

[newsun]

20 minutes ago, Graf said:

Seems like Seamus needs a pinned guide thread a lot 😅.

Totally, the advice is good though scattered amidst many threads now.

[thewrathchilde]

1 hour ago, Da Git said:

@Fetid Strumpet if you don't use Belles or Sybelle, what models are you using using to push the enemy to trigger Why, hello luv! Just Doxies? The Daze trigger on Seamus' gun?

OOK or versatile models? 

I am not @Fetid Strumpet but I think he has a similar approach to mine (except his use of Toshiro). 
 

I use Doxies, the Bowled Over trigger on Archie, the Daze trigger on Nurses, the Daze trigger on Seamus, and the Reap trigger on the Rider. 
 

I always have some combination of these in my list depending on the pool so sometimes it’s one of each of these, other times I have 2 x Doxies. When possible I like to have a Doxy in the middle with him in order to get work out of Redchapel Killer at the same time. 

[thewrathchilde]

1 hour ago, Graf said:

Seems like Seamus needs a pinned guide thread a lot 😅.

 

1 hour ago, newsun said:

Totally, the advice is good though scattered amidst many threads now.

There is a Seamus Deep Dice coming out from Third Floor Wars soon. Maybe wait and see what it covers. 
 

ideally we don’t need a master specific pin we need a Table of Contents thread pinned where we can just link threads about different masters, strategies, etc.