Vs Shenlong

[Balseraph]

Greetings my friends! 

I am new to Malifaux, and I have been informed that I am to play against Shenlong on Wednesday. 

Are there any shenanigans/gotcha moments I should look out for? This is against one of our more experienced players.

Are there any specific models I should look at on the Arcanist side to help against Shenlong?

I appreciate your time and input.

Edit: I should point out we are playing at 35ss I guess not sure if that changes things!

[Cursed25]

harness the ley line and dig their graves wil be really hard to do against him. Shenlong can move any scheme, corpse, scrap markers with one of his abilities by targeting your models with a duel or relenting with his models (no TN so always works even on black joker)

 

Shenlong his a monster if he has chi! attack him often to force him to use his chi on defense instead of attacks. Models with  to hit or to damage are not a good defense against him! 

 

Monks either hits hard (Shenlong ang high river), scheme really well (wandering river) or are good support (Sensei Yu, Low River) but they are very glass canon! Pressure them a lot and be really aggresive! 

[mythicFOX]

Playing into potent combat masters at lower points is always rough because you tend to need the points for tools.  Against Shen I like to what an extra copy of Magical Training on my master or another soft target.  Counterspell makes it more costly for him to get the juicy triggers.

I'd be aiming to target Vendetta and Deliver as my schemes but would need to know what your options are like?

At 35 I'd be tempted by;   Sandeep (+MT),  Banasuva, Kandara, Soulstone Miner (+MT), Carlos Vasquez, Fire Gamin, and cache 4.

[Balseraph]

3 hours ago, mythicFOX said:

 

I'd be aiming to target Vendetta and Deliver as my schemes but would need to know what your options are like?

 

I'm new enough/lucky enough that I can borrow/proxy pretty much anything while I'm still getting a handle on the game.

I really like the look of Sandeep, he was up there with my first purchase choices along with Toni and Raspy.

[bedjy]

First of all, ask your experienced opponent to go easy on you (whatever he is playing).

If "knew to Malifaux" means you've played between 0-2 games :

I think you should play whatever keyword you want with at least a little mobility. Focus your attention on understanding your models. Read them 10times if needed.

If you're getting a little familiar with the mechanics (3+ games), then look for some mobile models in the keyword of your choosing to make every scheme and/or fighting. Shenlong's crew is quite sensible to high stats actions.

[Ogid]

In RES there was a recent discussion about the master, you may get some ideas there: https://themostexcellentandawesomeforumever-wyrd.com/topic/147667-what-to-bring-vs-shenlong/

Shenlong has an answer for everything, Armor, Shielded, H2W... any defensive tech may be ignored or turned against the model and he is very mobile and kind of tanky while he still have chi, but when he runs out of chi he can be focused down quickly. "Take the hit" or "Bedside Manners" could make harder for him to finish quicky a high priority target. Other than that, try to force him to expend chi, using hazardous auras could also hinder him. Don't overlook the supports, monks brings a TON of healing (and expect Focused from Tanukis)

Probably Ironsides may ruin his day if he gets too close. I'd avoid Colette and Hoffman versus him.

Good luck!

 

[admiralvorkraft]

Nope - he turns off defensive triggers with an upgrade too.

[Ogid]

4 hours ago, admiralvorkraft said:

Nope - he turns off defensive triggers with an upgrade too.

Good point, I forgot about Masked agent.

Even with that one Toni isn't a bad pick, the adrenaline may be used as damage reduction, she has 14 Wds, could make 4 attacks per turn expending adrenaline to burn his Chi, Mouse heals a lot and MSU in general is a nasty bubble to try to dive.

[admiralvorkraft]

Fair point, I may be a bit defeatist when it comes to Shenlong 😛

[CD1248]

You could also put Magical Training on Toni to tax his triggers, Shen really wants to be declaring a trigger every time he attacks against hard targets like her, so Counterspell messes with him pretty bad.

[Balseraph]

Good Morning Ladies and Gentlemen.

Figured I should give you an update on how your advice went last night. I did indeed take Toni with Magical Training. 

Turn 1 Shenlong did his thing, stacking 6ish Chi. As it was 35 points, he did not put an upgrade on Shen, instead opting for bodies to push corrupted idols around.

Turn 2 Shenlong came in, and got stymied by the Ironsides/Amina/Captain bubble. He did not realize how defensive it would end up being.  Now you may realize something at this point that I did not. That's a lot of points at 35. I was getting 2 pass tokens a turn. And was quickly realizing I didn't have the bodies to do schemes and strategies, I had become so focuses on stopping Shen. I will point out that I believe I got Shen and the Sensei down to 1 would on this turn, because I didn't calculate hard to wound into my math, and they both were able to heal up after.

Turn 3 Shenlong bounced into my backfield killing both Mouse and a Gunsmith in one activation.

Turn 4 Shenlong tries to get to Amina, but his only route takes him into melee with Toni as well. So he is forced to attack Toni, which puts him low enough to kill on my activation. 

Turn 5 is a scramble for me to catch up in score, but with only 3 models, it ends up being a tie, 3 to 3. We both scored 2 points on the strategy, and he got 1 point on deliver a message, and I got 1 point on breakthrough. We both had our vendetta models killed in stupid ways before they got to score 

We both talked about mistakes that we made, and oh boy, was there a laundry list for both of us. But, without your help, I definitely would have fallen victim to Shenlong's shenanigans, and would have been steamrolled. Thank you for sharing your knowledge!

 

 

 

 

[Balseraph]

On 10/29/2019 at 8:55 AM, bedjy said:

First of all, ask your experienced opponent to go easy on you (whatever he is playing).

If "knew to Malifaux" means you've played between 0-2 games :

I think you should play whatever keyword you want with at least a little mobility. Focus your attention on understanding your models. Read them 10times if needed.

If you're getting a little familiar with the mechanics (3+ games), then look for some mobile models in the keyword of your choosing to make every scheme and/or fighting. Shenlong's crew is quite sensible to high stats actions.

Just for perspective, I had 1 demo game, then a 30 and 35 SS game prior to this. So it was game 4 for me.

[Ogid]

Nice to hear it worked out!

Some thoughts:

You probably used it, but just in case: "Bring it" is a great way to misposition him / important monks to be killed (specialy considering that without masked agent those attacks would trigger "Good shot, my turn"), but it can also be used to reposition allied models (work better if those aren't dangerous beaters or are far away and won't attack her; but at least she can cheat a low ram to heal)

I wouldn't had picked the captain, monks aren't that shooty to need his aura and Shenlong may ignore SS reduction so being a Henchman isn't that valuable versus him. I'd had picked Howard Langston instead. Shenlong can't tech against Armor and Terrifying at the same time, 3 attack or 2 attacks plus a Hazardous aura is good to have versus him; plus being a construct he can be easily buffed by an Steamfitter (Shielded and Focused).

Amina reach of the union is very good, but it's an expensive support model for a 35 SS game imo.

40 minutes ago, Balseraph said:

Shenlong bounced into my backfield killing both Mouse and a Gunsmith in one activation.

This is one of the big dangers of him, he jumping in the backline and killing squishy but important models. I'd had picked small models to prevent that instead of Amina (Mannequin / Medical Automaton for example); that would make it harder for him to kill the targets he want and it'd give you a few extra bodies for schemes after Shenlong is deal with.

There are also some small models that may be a pain in the ass for him, Steam Arachnids may be killed easily; but he won't want to spend his AP attacking 3 SS models, they can be near of other models because they are evasive and on top of that they can also score. The latch On ability will make him Df4; which will make it easier to hit even if she uses Chi. Unless the strategy is Reckoning, these are very interesting. The effigy could be also handy for the aura and the dispel magic, is decently tanky and can also score.

1 hour ago, Balseraph said:

Just for perspective, I had 1 demo game, then a 30 and 35 SS game prior to this. So it was game 4 for me.

Considering you have 4 games under your belt and how good Shenlong is, WP 👌

[mythicFOX]

Thanks for the update!  Glad people were able to help.