Models and keywords that need a boost/redesign

[Nagi21]

7 hours ago, Regelridderen said:

@Nagi21 Iggy and ‘dora would have auto-killed anything in Burning hazardous terrain without the nerf - So it’s probably for the best if not perfect. 😜

Legit question: Aside from Kaeris and Reva, what are you doing where there's burning hazardous terrain around?

[Adran]

7 hours ago, Nagi21 said:

Legit question: Aside from Kaeris and Reva, what are you doing where there's burning hazardous terrain around?

Well there is sonnia and sandeep...

[Regelridderen]

7 hours ago, Nagi21 said:

Legit question: Aside from Kaeris and Reva, what are you doing where there's burning hazardous terrain around?

Quite often tables around here come with a burning ruin, a river of lava and/or a pool of industrial sewage.

I did a table once of linked H3 plateaus over a Hazardous (no condition) river, and the woes dominated the board in the most horrifying way, simply pushing people into damage and wasted activations (Glimpse of Insanity meant getting Stunned and taking 1 Damage from falling, 1 from landing in hazardous, then 1 from getting out and ‘wasting’ an AP just climbing back into position. 

-

I find it fairly important to use terrain that does more than just blocking movement, and adding LOS modifiers. Quite a lot of crews have ways to exploit this in some form or another, or advantages can come at a price - e.g. A concealing Fog cloud, can just as well be an industrial vent shooting scalding steam out, or a smouldering fire on the battle field.

[GrumpyGrandpa]

On 6/9/2020 at 3:59 PM, RisingPhoenix said:

Gremlins:

Wong - So close to being good.  Just need to tweak and playtest.  Crew-wide fast is scary, there's a right balance there.

Ulix - Not actually a bad crew, but why is Grow Up Strong so bad?  You need an 8 to upgrade a model two soulstones.  A 12 to grow it 4.  It does have an obey, but that costs a tome or soulstone (for a 2 soulstone upgrade and a master action...).   And he's honestly psychotically card hungry.  I know I complained about summoners getting card draw, but he has 2 actions on the front of his card that take cards, and no good draw way.  Add  to Slop 'em Up 

I'm just gonna add my vote on both of these . +1 from me. 

Wizz-bang seems to be in such a wierd place. I feel like the crew could become broken with just a few changes, but they feel out of place right now.

Ulix is insanely card hungry, and it feels horrible to have BBB / Bokor glued on the crew.  I'd love to se an alternative. Maybe something that makes Penelope more involved - Draw a card if you Replace a Pig near her.

Also:

On 6/9/2020 at 3:59 PM, RisingPhoenix said:

Rasputina - Needs a lot, as we're discussing

Yes. Very much so.
 

[Maniacal_cackle]

On the topic of Misery, it always felt so strong to me. A 2" push is super good, especially in a faction with loads of 2" engage.

The 'once per activation' limitation is pretty meaningless in my view, given how many auras you have. Far more relevant is that the auras don't stack, so there are pretty bad diminishing returns on woe models. The more misery you have, the weaker it gets.

So a model that offers misery isn't really adding much to a crew that already has a few sources of it.

[Taxidermied]

 

12 hours ago, Nagi21 said:

Legit question: Aside from Kaeris and Reva, what are you doing where there's burning hazardous terrain around?

Iggy can generate his own outside of a Kaeris crew.  Unlikely, but possible.

[Passenty]

46 minutes ago, Maniacal_cackle said:

On the topic of Misery, it always felt so strong to me. A 2" push is super good, especially in a faction with loads of 2" engage.

The 'once per activation' limitation is pretty meaningless in my view, given how many auras you have. Far more relevant is that the auras don't stack, so there are pretty bad diminishing returns on woe models. The more misery you have, the weaker it gets.

So a model that offers misery isn't really adding much to a crew that already has a few sources of it.

I think misery is plainly bad design on many levels. The ability should work only with stunned (so dora doesnt counter some masters just by exsisting) , should stack( so there is an incline to take keyword models) and should not be restricted to once per turn. That would make the woes work as they should - putting and removing stunned with a crew for benefits - instead of counter your focus or other condition you need and sometimes dish out a ping. Misery working with stunned only would also disable all unwanted synergies like iggy+kaeris without restricting misery itself.

[Zebo]

Mmm When you say that Misery should stack, you mean that you think that a model gaining Stunned near 4 woes should suffer 4 wounds by the face? 

[Nagi21]

Just now, Zebo said:

Mmm When you say that Misery should stack, you mean that you think that a model gaining Stunned near 4 woes should suffer 4 wounds by the face? 

That's close to how she used to work in 2e (1e was even more crazy if you can believe it).  Sure it was really strong, but it only was really strong when you were in the short-range misery bubble.  Also, and this is important, opportunist wasn't a thing, so you couldn't constantly gain and lose conditions in the same activation.  Granted misery pinged off failed WP duels (and with pandora, everything was a WP duel), but it's like if you took Toni, and they said her bubble is too strong, so you could only have one grit ability trigger per turn.  Negates the whole theme of the crew. 

[esqulax]

57 minutes ago, Zebo said:

Mmm When you say that Misery should stack, you mean that you think that a model gaining Stunned near 4 woes should suffer 4 wounds by the face? 

I mean, Woes aren't that tanky. If you are standing in the middle of 4 unkilled ones, then you deserve to have bad things happen to you. 

[Zebo]

 

1 hour ago, esqulax said:

I mean, Woes aren't that tanky. If you are standing in the middle of 4 unkilled ones, then you deserve to have bad things happen to you. 

Yes, because Woes don't have things like Stat 7 Lures, or 6" Auras. 

[ShinChan]

1 hour ago, esqulax said:

I mean, Woes aren't that tanky. If you are standing in the middle of 4 unkilled ones, then you deserve to have bad things happen to you. 

 

19 minutes ago, Zebo said:

 

Yes, because Woes don't have things like Stat 7 Lures, or 6" Auras. 

Or a model that is all about movement shenanigans...

[RisingPhoenix]

4 hours ago, GrumpyGrandpa said:

I'm just gonna add my vote on both of these . +1 from me. 

Wizz-bang seems to be in such a wierd place. I feel like the crew could become broken with just a few changes, but they feel out of place right now.

Ulix is insanely card hungry, and it feels horrible to have BBB / Bokor glued on the crew.  I'd love to se an alternative. Maybe something that makes Penelope more involved - Draw a card if you Replace a Pig near her.

Maybe what we were discussing with other factions, replacing card draw with less discarding too.  Maybe we could switch Sturdy Critters to "Gain Staggered" for the damage reduction - something you won't always want to do, but doesn't take cards.  Switch it so Major can take 1 damage to push the minion and give it a suit (it is an AP on a 10 stone model, after all).  Then it'd just be Protected, and honestly Ulix can probably use positioning tricks to hide from a lot of things - he's Sz 1, 30 mm in the middle of a bunch of Sz 2/3 models on 40/50s.  Even getting LOS on him is going to be a trick, so protected can charge you cards when you mess that up.    

[Nagi21]

10 hours ago, Zebo said:

 

Yes, because Woes don't have things like Stat 7 Lures, or 6" Auras. 

Hmm... Stat 7 lure... 6" aura... where have I heard that before...

Oh right, Toni.  Actually no... hers is better since it's mv + 2...

[Maniacal_cackle]

Personally I think that this (unlimited Misery + stacks) would be insanely powerful. The crew is already pretty darn powerful, it is just lacking in some areas. Like Reva and Revanent, Woe could easily go from "doesn't quite work" to top tier broken IMO.

Perhaps instead the minions could have more utility to make the bubble more dangerous, but not directly more damaging. Consider Montresor in Tormented, who makes it so staggered doesn't fall off.

Could have something like:

• Sorrows have an aura that makes it so stunned doesn't come off models (or gets reapplied for an extra misery trigger when it does fall off).
• A minion with an aura "When a model within 3 gains stunned, it also gains staggered."
• Or an aura that says that a model with stunned cannot use bonus actions at all, or a model with stunned cannot charge, or a model with stunned cannot disengage.

Etc. Woe have SO MUCH DAMAGE already, I'd say that a buff for them should be utility based. Something to restrict enemy movement or actions in their bubble (as giving Woe more movement seems like a bad idea). It is also very thematic, just draining away the ability to do anything when you're near a Woe crew.

[Nagi21]

1 hour ago, Maniacal_cackle said:

Personally I think that this (unlimited Misery + stacks) would be insanely powerful. The crew is already pretty darn powerful, it is just lacking in some areas. Like Reva and Revanent, Woe could easily go from "doesn't quite work" to top tier broken IMO.

Perhaps instead the minions could have more utility to make the bubble more dangerous, but not directly more damaging. Consider Montresor in Tormented, who makes it so staggered doesn't fall off.

Could have something like:

• Sorrows have an aura that makes it so stunned doesn't come off models (or gets reapplied for an extra misery trigger when it does fall off).
• A minion with an aura "When a model within 3 gains stunned, it also gains staggered."
• Or an aura that says that a model with stunned cannot use bonus actions at all, or a model with stunned cannot charge, or a model with stunned cannot disengage.

Etc. Woe have SO MUCH DAMAGE already, I'd say that a buff for them should be utility based. Something to restrict enemy movement or actions in their bubble (as giving Woe more movement seems like a bad idea). It is also very thematic, just draining away the ability to do anything when you're near a Woe crew.

Here's the thing though: Woe only have so much damage (and their damage is really overstated unless your opponent walks into you) vs crews they're already good against.  And yes sure you can say the obvious thing like "Well don't take them out of good matchups", but the issue is, with the blind picking of crews, each faction has bad matchups for her, and her crew suffers the same issue Rasputina does in that if she's in a bad matchup, it doesn't do very much.  Sure Pandora and Candy do a lot of damage, but the rest of the crew is just not good.  Kade has some use, but against wp crews its not so great and he's squishy, and all the other high damage woe options are extremely expensive, so you don't get a Woe bubble, you just get a bunch of expensive woe models because the alternatives are not viable in the current state.

To your examples:

- An aura to reapply stunned might work, but that leaves Aversions and Lyssa's in the same place.

- I fail to see the effectiveness of giving staggered as well as stunned, especially in an aura half the size of the already short misery aura.

- Could work but it doesn't help the issue at hand, being that Lyssa/Sorrow/Aversions are easily deleted and don't do damage for their cost.

Also an aside:

15 hours ago, Zebo said:

Mmm When you say that Misery should stack, you mean that you think that a model gaining Stunned near 4 woes should suffer 4 wounds by the face? 

That's 4 models your opponent paid for.  Assuming they're sorrows + 1 whatever, that's 20+ points of model to do 4 damage.  Frankly that's a bargain of damage for cost.

[Maniacal_cackle]

3 minutes ago, Nagi21 said:

Here's the thing though: Woe only have so much damage (and their damage is really overstated unless your opponent walks into you) vs crews they're already good against.  And yes sure you can say the obvious thing like "Well don't take them out of good matchups", but the issue is, with the blind picking of crews, each faction has bad matchups for her, and her crew suffers the same issue Rasputina does in that if she's in a bad matchup, it doesn't do very much.  Sure Pandora and Candy do a lot of damage, but the rest of the crew is just not good.  Kade has some use, but against wp crews its not so great and he's squishy, and all the other high damage woe options are extremely expensive, so you don't get a Woe bubble, you just get a bunch of expensive woe models because the alternatives are not viable in the current state.

This is somewhat true, but in my experience the biggest obstacle is Pandora not having good things to hit with her 10" attack. Giving her another ranged attack could solve the problem. Something like "Target gains injured 1, then suffers 1 irreducible damage for every condition it has."

5 minutes ago, Nagi21 said:

- An aura to reapply stunned might work, but that leaves Aversions and Lyssa's in the same place.

I think probably the crew needs multiple small buffs spread across all the minions (although I hear Aversion are actually pretty good, I've not fielded them yet).

5 minutes ago, Nagi21 said:

- I fail to see the effectiveness of giving staggered as well as stunned, especially in an aura half the size of the already short misery aura.

Stunned + staggered means a model is going to likely be pretty useless for its next activation if it is a melee model. And this also means you get two misery activations, so you can ensure it is in an awkward spot, moving it up to 4 inches (may take two action just to get it back to its original position).

For something that just happens from giving it a condition (often a bonus action), that's pretty powerful.

7 minutes ago, Nagi21 said:

- Could work but it doesn't help the issue at hand, being that Lyssa/Sorrow/Aversions are easily deleted and don't do damage for their cost.

They also only cost 4/5/6 stones. Most 4/5/6 stone models that are taken are taken for utility - Little Gasser, Restless Spirit, Crooligans, Dead Dandy, Necropunk, Night Terrors, Ashigaru (summoned), Alps (summoned), Nurse, Gravediggers, etc.

IMO, 4/5/6 cost models should generally be utility oriented (can't exactly turn them into min 3 beaters).

9 minutes ago, Nagi21 said:

That's 4 models your opponent paid for.  Assuming they're sorrows + 1 whatever, that's 20+ points of model to do 4 damage.  Frankly that's a bargain of damage for cost.

From an action efficiency perspective, it is also just 1 action. Or if you use candy to do it, you get to the point where a model that activates gains stunned, discards a card, and takes 4 damage without any actions spent beyond positioning. Similar for a model attacking Pandora and her using defensive trigger for stun.

Not to mention this just makes her bubble more dangerous (which is already insanely dangerous), whereas your main complaint seems to be based on her not being good against certain crews (where the bubble is less likely to apply).

Although personally I think keep her as a bubble crew.

[Nagi21]

3 minutes ago, Maniacal_cackle said:

I think probably the crew needs multiple small buffs spread across all the minions (although I hear Aversion are actually pretty good, I've not fielded them yet).

Aversions are ok in that they're tanky, but they don't really benefit the crew in any kind of synergistic way other than moving Candy up.  It's kinda like a worse version of an insidious.  They also do basically no damage at all even with misery.

4 minutes ago, Maniacal_cackle said:

They also only cost 4/5/6 stones. Most 4/5/6 stone models that are taken are taken for utility - Little Gasser, Restless Spirit, Crooligans, Dead Dandy, Necropunk, Night Terrors, Ashigaru (summoned), Alps (summoned), Nurse, Gravediggers, etc.

IMO, 4/5/6 cost models should generally be utility oriented (can't exactly turn them into min 3 beaters).

I mean a single 4/5/6 model should, but you get 1 damage from 1, 2 damage from 2, etc.  It's not heresy to have high damage output from complementary cheap models (also look at things like bushwackers...).

4 minutes ago, Maniacal_cackle said:

From an action efficiency perspective, it is also just 1 action. Or if you use candy to do it, you get to the point where a model that activates gains stunned, discards a card, and takes 4 damage without any actions spent beyond positioning. Similar for a model attacking Pandora and her using defensive trigger for stun.

Not to mention this just makes her bubble more dangerous (which is already insanely dangerous), whereas your main complaint seems to be based on her not being good against certain crews (where the bubble is less likely to apply).

Although personally I think keep her as a bubble crew.

Honestly having Misery go from an aura to a "within 6" would probably be best.  Yes you can hit for a lot of damage but it's still once per activation, and it's still stoppable, and it's still within that really short range bubble to maximize damage.  I mean really, how many times have you been completely clustered in a 6" bubble where you could put out 4 misery pulses.  It's usually 2, maybe 3 if it's the main bubble, but often you have to spread out unless it's a completely one sided pool.

My main complaint is that there's no reason to play a risky cheap woe bubble when it's better just to take expensive woes and use them similar to Asami's models in giving and taking conditions to get positives instead of using the main theme and ability of the crew.

[Zebo]

Sorry, but can't but disagree with the idea of Misery being stackable. 6" Is in fact a very long range for a effect that affects enemies and is passive and damaging. Entropy is half the range and not once per activation, but once per turn (unless some model manages to activate twice in a turn), and nobody is asking to make it stackable. 

Even more, Misery can be quite annoying denying the enemy to score, pushing the model with lodestone away of strategy markers, the Hidden Martyr away from engagement, etc... Or also pushing enemy models out of their own bubbles. 

If there's some problem with cheap Woe monions not being worth enough, maybe they should try to improve them, but not to directly change the whole crew special rule and make it so broken. 

Because yes, I think it would be broken to allow Misery to stack. 

[Nagi21]

14 minutes ago, Zebo said:

Sorry, but can't but disagree with the idea of Misery being stackable. 6" Is in fact a very long range for a effect that affects enemies and is passive and damaging. 

This is patently false unless you're giving yourself conditions.  Woes have one thing that gives out a condition without having to take an action, and that's Pandora's defensive trigger.  Everything else requires AP to use (whether that be regular or bonus AP).  6" is not very good for an ability that both requires AP and is severely limited.

[Zebo]

Well, I'm gonna take in consideration only the Stunned condition, since it's the only source of Misery in common. 

I may be the only in this thought, but I think Stunned by itself it's enough punishment for 1 action. 

[Adran]

1 hour ago, Nagi21 said:

This is patently false unless you're giving yourself conditions.  Woes have one thing that gives out a condition without having to take an action, and that's Pandora's defensive trigger.  Everything else requires AP to use (whether that be regular or bonus AP).  6" is not very good for an ability that both requires AP and is severely limited.

There is also Candy who literally just gives out stunned by standing there (and also costs you a card).  

In addition several of the stunned handed out by the crew are triggers on actions, so you would probably be doing the action anyway. So whilst it does require an action, its not the sole result of the action. Likewise if the model doesn't have another bonus action then the cost of its bonus action to apply stunned is a very low cost.

 

5 hours ago, Nagi21 said:

Here's the thing though: Woe only have so much damage (and their damage is really overstated unless your opponent walks into you) vs crews they're already good against.  And yes sure you can say the obvious thing like "Well don't take them out of good matchups", but the issue is, with the blind picking of crews, each faction has bad matchups for her, and her crew suffers the same issue Rasputina does in that if she's in a bad matchup, it doesn't do very much.  Sure Pandora and Candy do a lot of damage, but the rest of the crew is just not good.  Kade has some use, but against wp crews its not so great and he's squishy, and all the other high damage woe options are extremely expensive, so you don't get a Woe bubble, you just get a bunch of expensive woe models because the alternatives are not viable in the current state.

This I think is a core issue. The woe crew has some good match ups, and some bad match ups. 

There are 2 ways to make a "balanced" crew. you can make it so they are sometimes good and sometimes bad, or you could make it so they are the same level for every game they play.

Both have advantages and disadvantages.

Malifaux in my opinion has generally gone for the first option. The crew can do well in some circumstances, but will struggle in other circumstances. This is part of the reason why Gaining grounds exists, to force the previous "Best" crews to have to change how you play them.  You do have to be careful on this approach that you don't make the difference between the 2 crews powerlevels in any set game unsurmontable. Each master has to at least have a chance in each game against each other master.  As long as the master has those options available, then they can compete.  Rasputina can play a mobility game, but you would build a very different crew for her than you would for a killy game. Its not her best crew, but she does have the tools available to at least have a chance. Since the malifaux rules have you build the crew after you know what they game requirements are, you have a degree of control over the badness of the match up.

This can lead to a slightly strange occurances. A master could be unbeatable in 2/3rds of the games, but automatically lose the remaining 1/3. Now a 66% win percentage is very good, but this master would never win a fixed master event because a 2-1 record is not going to win a swiss tournement.  So this can lead to a master that is both too strong and too weak at the same time.

 

 

[Nagi21]

9 hours ago, Adran said:

There is also Candy who literally just gives out stunned by standing there (and also costs you a card).  

In addition several of the stunned handed out by the crew are triggers on actions, so you would probably be doing the action anyway. So whilst it does require an action, its not the sole result of the action. Likewise if the model doesn't have another bonus action then the cost of its bonus action to apply stunned is a very low cost.

I knew I was forgetting someone.  Ironically the second best model in the crew.  As far as the require an action, remember that most of the Woes can only stun on a bonus action, meaning they get one chance to do it.  If your opponent cheats to stop it, you do exactly 0 damage.  

 

9 hours ago, Adran said:

This I think is a core issue. The woe crew has some good match ups, and some bad match ups. 

I think you're missing the core issue.  The main issue is that Pandora has one effective way to play competitively, which goes against the entire theme of her crew.  Can you play a cheap misery trigger bubble and just hand out short ranged stun vs some crews?  Sure, but it's going to take significantly more effort and be a lot higher risk than just using opportunist on expensive models like Candy and Carver, and supporting them with things like Rider and Kade.  The lack of being able to play her in any other kind of good way, combined with the handful of just counter picks across the factions make her a risky and unattractive crew competitively.  

It's basically the same as Raspy and Euri.  If it's great, it's borderline broken.  But that great only happens maybe 20% of the time and the rest of the time it's an uphill slog.

[RisingPhoenix]

Man, I really think focusing on Pandora is the wrong approach.  First, the Neverborn have Euripides, Titania, and Marcus who could all use a little extra love, and Lucius who could probably use a slight tweaking.Second, and more importantly, Pandora is a counter crew.  If GG1.5 buffs a bunch of crews so that they're more viable, Pandora's position in the meta will change.  Sure, she might get worse, but she might actually get better.  More, it'll be hard to evaluate what is good or bad.  

If you do any change, just remove Misery from Pandora and give her Box of a Thousand Woes 8" Aura that does the exact same thing Misery does.  That'd let the master doublestack the Auras the way Hamlin's Source of the Contagion is different from his models' Diseased.  That'd make every keyword model in her crew better, but keeps a lid on the insanity possible with aura stacking.  Then see how it is in GG2, buff her then.  She's not so bad that she would suffer in this condition left an extra 6 months.

Oh and by the by, Aura stacking would definitely give Hamlin a nice buff I'm not entirely sure he needs.  As in it might be "OH MY GOD MY FACE" if he can go off with it.  Leveticus would also very much appreciate the overlapping Entropy bubbles.  I'm not entirely sure that melee crews would even be able to beat him at all if that went through.  "At the start of your activation take 5 damage" sounds a bit unfair.  For Leveticus' crew in particular, because oh boy do they have damage outside of auras.

[Nagi21]

11 hours ago, RisingPhoenix said:

Man, I really think focusing on Pandora is the wrong approach.  First, the Neverborn have Euripides, Titania, and Marcus who could all use a little extra love, and Lucius who could probably use a slight tweaking.Second, and more importantly, Pandora is a counter crew.  If GG1.5 buffs a bunch of crews so that they're more viable, Pandora's position in the meta will change.  Sure, she might get worse, but she might actually get better.  More, it'll be hard to evaluate what is good or bad.  

If you do any change, just remove Misery from Pandora and give her Box of a Thousand Woes 8" Aura that does the exact same thing Misery does.  That'd let the master doublestack the Auras the way Hamlin's Source of the Contagion is different from his models' Diseased.  That'd make every keyword model in her crew better, but keeps a lid on the insanity possible with aura stacking.  Then see how it is in GG2, buff her then.  She's not so bad that she would suffer in this condition left an extra 6 months.

Oh and by the by, Aura stacking would definitely give Hamlin a nice buff I'm not entirely sure he needs.  As in it might be "OH MY GOD MY FACE" if he can go off with it.  Leveticus would also very much appreciate the overlapping Entropy bubbles.  I'm not entirely sure that melee crews would even be able to beat him at all if that went through.  "At the start of your activation take 5 damage" sounds a bit unfair.  For Leveticus' crew in particular, because oh boy do they have damage outside of auras.

I mean... we know we have Euri who needs work, and Marcus (although I refuse to acknowledge the latter as NVB.  We never wanted him and still don't).  Luci is good but complicated, and Titania's in an ok-ish place.  I'd say she needs less a tweak than Pandora.  Your idea for a second ability might work.  Might make sorrows more like they were in 1e (hovering around Dora specifically).  I also disagree in your thought that Pandora is a counter crew.  You can't counter pick entire masters since crew selection is blind, but she doesn't have the ability to counter build to at least one matchup in each faction.  A counter crew is a crew that can get an even game in any matchup, i.e. Dreamer.

Also I'm not saying to change the aura rules, I'm talking about changing misery itself.  We have abilities that say "within x" without it being an aura.  Would not be the craziest thing, particularly with the once per activation restriction.