Good vs bad matchups for Viks

[psychogeek]

About to take a dive Into the merc crew but wanted to get feedback on what factions and crews are generally rough matchups. 
 

I would assume that neverborn are more difficult as they have lots of terrain (Fae) and lots of terrifying. 

[Jesy Blue]

The problem I have with Mercenary is Idols as there is so little healing and so few wounds in keyword.

The best tool I have is other people's expectations.  When you say Viktorias everyone thinks alpha strike and melee rush, and set up to counter the oncoming assault.  So, I don't assault and instead outmanuver where they don't set up the counter assault and leave them hanging for 2 turns are they catch up.

[Zebo]

I would say any tough crew. Ironically, in this edition Mercenary (and viks) struggles versus armored crews.

[psychogeek]

2 hours ago, Zebo said:

I would say any tough crew. Ironically, in this edition Mercenary (and viks) struggles versus armored crews.

But the ronin Ignore armor and have a decent damage track. So it seems the crew still has options vs armor.

The lack of general healing does make sense why they would suffer in idols. 
 

they look like a good fit for turf war or play explosives. 

[Jesy Blue]

The common thing I always do is Viks, Bishop, & TMS:  they all get 3 AP so economy of actions with the 4 of them is great.

[Micawber]

3 hours ago, Zebo said:

I would say any tough crew. Ironically, in this edition Mercenary (and viks) struggles versus armored crews.

I've played the Viks into my own VS crew and I never felt like armor was a big problem - maybe with the exception of mass armor 2 like in Hoffmanns crew.  I almost always play 2 Ronin and with flurry they alone can often finish off armored foes by themselves. If I'm playing against lots of armor I usually pair each of them with a Vik and stone for the -trigger on the Vik to get more armor-ignoring attacks out of the Ronin.
 

Mind dmg of 3 on the Viks is in itself not too bad against armor +1 and you can always stagger and slow tough targets with Bishop until you're ready to overwhelm them with numbers.

I also hold the not too popular opinion that Deperate Mercenaries are not too shabby, ESPECIALLY against armor crews. Just pling them to death with a potential 3 shots per activation and if you get lucky with the dmg the moderate of 3 makes it not for nought against armor +1.

[explorator]

1 hour ago, Micawber said:

I've played the Viks into my own VS crew and I never felt like armor was a big problem - maybe with the exception of mass armor 2 like in Hoffmanns crew.  I almost always play 2 Ronin and with flurry they alone can often finish off armored foes by themselves. If I'm playing against lots of armor I usually pair each of them with a Vik and stone for the -trigger on the Vik to get more armor-ignoring attacks out of the Ronin.
 

Mind dmg of 3 on the Viks is in itself not too bad against armor +1 and you can always stagger and slow tough targets with Bishop until you're ready to overwhelm them with numbers.

I also hold the not too popular opinion that Deperate Mercenaries are not too shabby, ESPECIALLY against armor crews. Just pling them to death with a potential 3 shots per activation and if you get lucky with the dmg the moderate of 3 makes it not for nought against armor +1.

I am just now painting two Desperste Mercs for the exact reasons you say; their 14" range attack. For the same cost as Hans, you get a solid number of weak shots, which is nice in some situations.

[Ming]

I still don't see the point in taking either Bishop or Desperados. You can take better models for their cost. Please prove me wrong.

[Ogid]

1 hour ago, Ming said:

I still don't see the point in taking either Bishop or Desperados. You can take better models for their cost. Please prove me wrong.

You need to be more precise... better models for what role? What models would you take in place of these?

The Desperado is the only 4SS minion that crew may take and the only thing it does is ping damage from 14'' (having also good moderate/severe damage, so it may be good using focused attacks), that may be situationaly useful. The closest minion is a ronin (a model 50% more expensive with less firepower and less range but useful at mele range); the other two 4SS models are supportish models not competing for that long range pinging role (effigy/student). The Desperado seems the best in what he does.

Bishop defensive stats are good, he has 3 actions and may have min damage 3 (4 fliping a ram) among other shenanigans like Displacing an enemy model 8'' (plus giving it staggered) or slowing several models; all that on top of some self sustain in his Challenge... his weakness is the range 0'' in his mele but that's not a big deal having also Battle Tempo, Chain Gang and Knock Aside. How is he not good enough?

[Jesy Blue]

Bishop, as I said before, I use for the extra actions.  Usually I give him Servant upgrade to get him Herald with TMS.  6" move, Battle Tempo, Chain Gang, THEN his three actions after I'm already 11 inches away from the deployment zone.

The ability to guarantee the Knock Aside trigger is great for denying enemy schemes.

Also, little trick:  Challenge and the heal trigger do not say enemy, so if you got a friendly model that's just going to move and/or scheme, Adaptive with Tomes for a bonus action self heal on a 6+.

 

[Zebo]

7 hours ago, Ogid said:

The Desperado seems the best in what he does.

4ss for an attack with stat 5 that is gonna do 1 point of damage the most of the time?

Hans costs as 2 Desperate Mercenaries and does reliably more damage than them. And I not even like Hans.

[Ming]

7 hours ago, Ogid said:

The Desperado is the only 4SS minion that crew may take and the only thing it does is ping damage from 14'' (having also good moderate/severe damage, so it may be good using focused attacks), that may be situationaly useful. The closest minion is a ronin (a model 50% more expensive with less firepower and less range but useful at mele range); the other two 4SS models are supportish models not competing for that long range pinging role (effigy/student). The Desperado seems the best in what he does.

Bishop defensive stats are good, he has 3 actions and may have min damage 3 (4 fliping a ram) among other shenanigans like Displacing an enemy model 8'' (plus giving it staggered) or slowing several models; all that on top of some self sustain in his Challenge... his weakness is the range 0'' in his mele but that's not a big deal having also Battle Tempo, Chain Gang and Knock Aside. How is he not good enough?

Yes, the only thing DM can do is ping for 1 damage. Student and Child have a lot of tricks up the sleeve. Ronins provide many tricks for 2SS, including HtK. They are good for scheme running and killing.

Bishop would be good, if there weren't any rivals for his stones. He has few defensive mechanics and 0" engage, which negates some of his fortes. Friendly challenge is a good idea though.

[Ogid]

Student and child has some cool tricks, but none of them may shot at 14''. The 1 damage ping may be useful in some scenarios (when fighting Armored guys or when Barbaros is in the crew) and in those same escenarios the Rapid Fire may be quite useful.

Let's imagine a Pacekeeper (df4, H2W, Armor2, 9Wds), the DM attack spam may deal 6 damage to that monster. 1 Ronin will deal 2 damage, Hans will deal also 2 damage but at least he could put some conditions on it (With some Luck, Hans could deal 5 damage with a Focused shot and double ram, but that requires winning the duel by a large margin cheating also a high ram so it's not reliable).

Plus his damage track is 1/3/5. The minimum damage is bad versus non-armored targets, but with focused attacks he may get the same or higher damage than a ronin 2/3/4 and similar to hans (2/3/5)

The other models has their advantages of course. Hans may get critical strike and ramp his damage up, has longer range expending focused, can inflict conditions from a mile; he is also much more reliable when shooting into Concealment, Cover, Friendly fire or Ronins are good in close combat. But for 4SS having a non-insignificant model that may put some long range pressure is good imo.

[ShinChan]

DM (do not confuse with Death Marshals) are plain bad. You're basically taken them to have a some extra ranged support, but:

• They're slower than the rest of the crew.
• Df4, Wp4, 4 wounds and only disguised as defensive technology, so they die to almost anything (specially shooting).
• Their melee attack is bad, and the shooting isn't much better. They have rapid fire yes, but in a crew that doesn't have much card draw.

 

[ShinChan]

On 11/3/2019 at 4:20 PM, psychogeek said:

But the ronin Ignore armor and have a decent damage track. So it seems the crew still has options vs armor.

The lack of general healing does make sense why they would suffer in idols. 
 

they look like a good fit for turf war or play explosives. 

I think that saying that a crew lacks of healing in Outcast is bull****. We have the Emissary, which also bring a nice tricks with the Student in Conflict in order to give fast to people.

Edit: sorry for unintentional double post

Edited November 5, 2019 by ShinChan
Double post

[Zebo]

12 minutes ago, Ogid said:

Let's imagine a Pacekeeper (df4, H2W, Armor2, 9Wds), the DM attack spam may deal 6 damage to that monster. 1 Ronin will deal 2 damage, Hans will deal also 2 damage but at least he could put some conditions on it (With some Luck, Hans could deal 5 damage with a Focused shot and double ram, but that requires winning the duel by a large margin cheating also a high ram so it's not reliable).

You are giving as a fact that DM suceeds on 6 attacks, and that one Ronin misses 2, because they ignore armor and also has flurry, so one ronin does 6 damage her alone, more with a ram.

I would not consider 1 point of damage long range pressure.

[Ogid]

16 minutes ago, Zebo said:

You are giving as a fact that DM suceeds on 6 attacks, and that one Ronin misses 2, because they ignore armor and also has flurry, so one ronin does 6 damage her alone, more with a ram.

I would not consider 1 point of damage long range pressure.

I'm comparing the 3 of them in the role the DM will perform. A Ronin reaching b2b with it will deal a lot of damage, but that's is another story (and a ronin will be a high priority target for Hoffman so I doubt she will get close to that target easily). From 12'' it'll deal 2 damage if her 2 shots hits while 1 DM (cheaper) will deal 3 if his 3 shots hits.

Against non-armored targets the desperate is better used with focused attacks putting in use the 3/5 part of his damage track.

For 4SS it's decent and to consider versus some crews imo.

[Jesy Blue]

3 hours ago, ShinChan said:

I think that saying that a crew lacks of healing in Outcast is bull****. We have the Emissary, which also bring a nice tricks with the Student in Conflict in order to give fast to people.

In keyword healing.

If you want to take your Emissary and Librarians and Johan, be my guest.

[Zebo]

3 hours ago, Ogid said:

For 4SS it's decent and to consider versus some crews imo.

I disagree, but if you're using them and they're doing a good job for you, congrats. That's not my experience with them. 

I've not played them too often, but every time I've hired them, I've regret and they have struggled badly to do anything useful. 

[Micawber]

I'm actually a little suprised by how many people struggle to find any use for the Desperate Mercenaries. A completely agree that they are one of the worse models in keyword and their use is limited but they are also not as bad as some here make them out to be.

They are Mv 5"-6" (depending on how often you move) unchargable 4ss significant minions with a 14" peashooter that can potentially fire thrice, or move 6" and fire twice. It is also in keyword in a crew that is pretty much the definition of a melee wall of death. Just keep them at max range, pling everything that is not engage and move up behind the rest of the crew to do scheming work.

With a 14" range and disguised you are practically immune against melee as long as you kite. If your opponent actually commits and runs at your Desperate Mercenaries to kill them you still get a card and a enemy model that is probably woefully out of position.

Comparing them to Hans does nothing for me. When I pick Hans I want either long distance debuffer or a dedicated hunter for terrifying/manipulative models. In most cases I want him to use each of his abilities once - Field Guide to discard a crow, the rifle to do a bit of dmg and slow and then his warning shot to distract, stun and push. Against terrifying and manipulative I mostly just discard rams and double shoot. In both cases I want him to stand still and shoot twice.
The two Desperate mercenaries that I get for one Hans can move and shoot easily and it is much less devastating if they don't connect. They can cover different ends of the board and I don't have the urge to position them in a central spot to reach as much as possible of the table like Hans.

I have the suspicion that much of the dislike comes from either not trying them at all or just playing them half-hearted to confirm a preconceived notion. Or, you know, your mileage may just vary.

 

[psychogeek]

Take this with a grain of salt as I have yet to play the crew, but 4ss minions are great as cheap scheme runners who can do a little something. I see desperate mercs as models who scheme first and provide fire support when its opportunistic. 

[ShinChan]

5 hours ago, Jesy Blue said:

In keyword healing.

If you want to take your Emissary and Librarians and Johan, be my guest.

Librarians are not in keyword and you have to pay extra. Johan healing is situational. 

But the Emissary is versatile, and brings more than healing to the crew. So any Outcast crew have the possibility of having a really nice healer without paying the tax of out of keyword.

[Ming]

If you need a healer, you can always take Vanessa. Also, the three sisters have built-in healing for kills.

Ronins are better fighters and scheme runners than desperados.  Also DM's rifles don't ignore anything, neither cover, nor concealment. Sometimes they can ignore Friendly Fire, if Viktoria's trigger is used. They don't have built-in positive flips or easy access to Focused or cards. It's the weakest shooting in the crew. Even Ronins are better shots. You can take desperados, when you need a cheap model for specific scheme.

[Ogid]

Haha, they are really hated, they should get renamed to Despised Mercenaries

I'm not saying they are a must have in every crew, but for a 4SS model, they seem very playable imo:

1 hour ago, Ming said:

Ronins are better fighters and scheme runners than desperados.

For Scheming Ronins are faster than a Desperado (10/15 vs 6/10) for 50% extra SS cost, but neither of them can drop 2 markers per turn. Also the Desperado may shoot twice after moving once, something the Ronin can't do. Ronins are capable mele fighters tho.

1 hour ago, Ming said:

Also DM's rifles don't ignore anything, neither cover, nor concealment. Sometimes they can ignore Friendly Fire, if Viktoria's trigger is used. They don't have built-in positive flips or easy access to Focused or cards.

All the above is quite reasonable for a 4SS model.

1 hour ago, Ming said:

Even Ronins are better shots.

Ronins have the same limitations shooting than the DM (can't ignore anything) and the same stat, but They can't shoot three times nor 2+move, have less maximum damage and range while being also 50% more expensive. DM are way better shooters than Ronins. The only advantage of the Ronin is higher weak damage that can be played around versus the right target with Focused and it doesn't matter versus armored targets.

1 hour ago, Ming said:

You can take desperados, when you need a cheap model for specific scheme.

This is their strenght. They are crappy, but they are getting the scheming job done for a very low SS cost while the rest of the models put pressure in the other team and if needed they can spam crappy shots useful versus some targets (primarily low defense armored guys or low defense cheap support models left behind). These SS are extra cache for the Viks or let the player upgrade a 8SS model to a 10SS model without reducing the cache; plus these guys have severe damage 5, not bad at all for a 4 SS model.

[Jesy Blue]

3 hours ago, Ming said:

If you need a healer, you can always take Vanessa. Also, the three sisters have built-in healing for kills.

I forgot about Vanessa.... I'm not using her this edition as I just don't find her very useful.  Into The Tray is just not as useful as the Sisters healing ability was, and with tax I can get a Librarian, with armor, that does more damage, and Consolidate Power is more useful than I've Got Your Back.

But maybe I'm being short sighted;  is anyone else getting value out if Vanessa?  I loved her to death in 2nd, but I just find her wanting in 3rd.