Schemy/Killy Dissonance

[Flib Jib]

I wanted to give a thought experiment and hear what everyone thinks. We have encountered this dissonance in games and meta's since the 1st edition, between two concepts, Schemy and Killy. Wyrd strongly advocates the idea that 'denial' and 'threat' hold equal significance and should be treated as such in decision-making. However, despite efforts to balance these aspects, the disharmony becomes super evident.

On one hand, there are potent methods of denying an opponent. These are often fun and entertaining but typically high-risk, rely on the opponent's play,  and are complicated to pull off. Paradoxically, the most effective means of denial turns out to be the simplest: merely eliminating the enemy model. What makes this realization more ironic is that this approach is also the easiest to execute. Why go through the trouble of employing complicated, high-risk strategies when a straightforward elimination is more efficient and effective?

Even if lethality was somehow less effective than denial, the fact that it is so much easier to implement naturally incentivizes players to use this strategy because humans usually have a higher success rate the easier a task is to execute.

The tragedy is that much of the time the denial approach tends to be more entertaining for players long-term. The payoff is always more gratifying than the ubiquitous kill strategy and presenting players the choice of ‘fun’ vs ‘optimal strategy’ is incredibly undesirable.

This frustrates me hearing the claim that these two inequalities are optimally balanced because it seems so willfully ignorant almost to the point of bad faith. I’m not super interested in counterpoints supporting that the two aspects might actually be balanced. I’m not closed-minded but more interested in creative ideas of how these mechanics might be brought more inline with each other.

In essence, the puzzle revolves around the challenge of reconciling the apparent contradiction between the pursuit of balance and the observable dominance of a simplistic, lethal approach. Thoughts…?
 

[SEV]

I don't understand your point. Killing is a core mechanic of Malifaux. It's a skirmish wargame after all...

Almost all gameplan will integrate it. The fun part of Faux is that you can't just go on a killing spree and expect to win every game. 

[aquenaton]

Hey! I am not sure I fully understand the core point either.

For a very long time (most of 2nd edition) some factions could try to play the classic "kill first, scheme later", that was very rewarding, as you say, as you simply had to take away the enemy models and then you could focus on scoring your objectives once there was no opposal on the table. I think this may have been mitigated by the new scoring mechanics of the strategies, where you need to start scoring since turn 2 or you will fall behind. It is still possible to focus on killing and at the final steps of the game switch focus into scoring, but right now it does not guarantee you will be able to fulfill those objectives.

Also, many schemes now rely on placing yourself close to the enemy and, in general, keeping them alive. If you start killing everything since turn 1, you may not even be able to score your own schemes. 

As Malifaux is a game that focuses a lot on resoure management, yes, killing an enemy will take all the potential actions the killed model could have done out of the ecuation. This has shifted for quite some time the meta into "strong, multiaction models" in stead of cheap models that can be killed by a single action of a heavy hitter. This is an issue that still persists in the game, as you will deploy less "schemy guys" and tend to focus more on "strong killers" that can scheme while deleteing one cheap enemy per turn. This could be considered an issue and fixing it would require generally to buff cheap models. 

If your point is that "while we have many scheme options, i will always choose the killy  ones over the schemy ones because it will be more fulfilling to be rewarded for doing the thing the game without objectives is currently rewarding me to do", then yes, it could be said, but again, many schemes that require killing are WAAAAY complex and difficult, as you need to meet specific conditions. Also, you will not always have assasinate and vendetta on the pool, or may end up facing enemies that will make those schemes very hard to achieve by existing. On the other hand, there are some crews that can control the board and scheme as well as stop the opponent without requiring to draw blood. 

I generally enjoy the game (it has become more complex that what I would like) but I really enjoy the possibility of winning while sacrificing all my team, as well as playing a game where no one is killed. Having the option of going for the kill all along is also a valid option, but I am not sure if that will ALWAYS be the best way to win each game.

 

If you expected more ways of "making the killing more optional", then I think that, creating schemes that rely on you keeping enemies in specific places (and not on killing them) is one way.

Making "killy" schemes more complex and specific is also a way of incentivate the use of more cheap mobile models to score by running.

Making models generally more difficult to kill would also make it not as optimal as focusing on what gives you points. If killing a scheme runner costs me 1 or 2 AP, then it is acceptable. If my 10ss hitter will need to run after that pesky 4ss scheme runner for 2 turns and spend three activations on trying to catch it and finally killing it, then it will not be worth it at all. Even less if it managed to drop a scheme that will give the opponent one VP.

[solkan]

On 7/23/2023 at 2:33 PM, Flib Jib said:

This frustrates me hearing the claim that these two inequalities are optimally balanced because it seems so willfully ignorant almost to the point of bad faith. I’m not super interested in counterpoints supporting that the two aspects might actually be balanced. I’m not closed-minded but more interested in creative ideas of how these mechanics might be brought more inline with each other.

Putting aside the fact that your position could be mistaken for arguing in bad faith, I think you should consider a few points:

1.  The game has a five turn limit.  That means that there are a fixed number of activations available to the player to score points.  This is one of the places where playing in a group setting like a tournament may help, because someone who decides to just kill the other player's models and not bother scoring many points won't do well in the relative rankings.  

2.  In many situations, a dead enemy model does not score any points.  In a certain notable scheme, the objective of the scheme is to get a specific friendly model killed by the opposing player.  In other schemes, points are only awarded for killing specific models in specific ways.

Have you only seen the schemes and strategies in the main rulebook, or have you seen the rest of the published schemes and strategies in Gaining Grounds?

 

[Adran]

I'm not sure I have ever heard it said that denial and threat are supposed to hold equal significance. 

I don't think that they are currently equal, but I also disagree with your view that other forms of denial are much harder than killing, and that a killing strategy is low risk and easy. What I do agree is that a killing strategy is a counter to a lot of the scoring strategies, where as several other of the denial strategies only work with denying certain approaches to scoring. But it is a "wargame" and even if people aren't rewarded for killing, they are generally going to kill because it is what they expect. 

Scheemy is very hard to define, because there are so many different ways to score points, and things which are good at breakthrough are not always the same as those good at leave your mark even though both are about dropping 4 markers to remove them to score 2 points. Of course if you are playing reckoning, then Killing becomes Threat as well as denial 

Overall I think the current edition is the most killy version of malifaux we have seen so far. This is a mixture of threat ranges, consistency in damage and most importantly, the scoring system that is currently in use. In the current game  37.5% (3/8)of your points can only be scored on the last turn. Whilst it is possible that some of the actions required to score these points can be done earlier in the game, most of the time, those actions can still be undone. Its certainly the only edition I haven't yet won a game despite being wiped out. 

I play in the UK where tournament events are almost always large enough that the positions are decide on tie breakers, either VP scored or points difference, both of which are not normally good if you focus too much on the denial game. So you might regually win all 3 rounds by killing everything your opponent has, but often come 3rd because at least 2 other people also won all rounds and scored better because they were less focused on killing. (assuming 17+ entrants which is common)

 

 

[aquenaton]

That makes sense. I did not realize but you are right, I have yet to win without models alive this edition.

The changes on the charge action have also made killing harder to avoid, as the hitter can walk and charge into my scheme runner, while in the past, the threat range tended to be smaller. A scheme runner was able to leave behind potential dangers with 2AP, and would be able to scheme one turn later. Right now, the "area denial" of a hitter is twice it's movement (if generalizing) in stead of just once as it was (generally) on m2e.

Your example on tournaments is very interesting, as it may seem that a game focused on killing is a game with less points that one that is focused on scoring. That way, on a tournament, you may end up winning all your games but place lower than players that focus on  scoring, but on a 1v1 game, against a rival, killing MAY give you the victory. Of course, there is no "right path". I have faced Colette, for example, and she could trample my McMourning team without killing my models while scoring perfectly, and I, who had a more agressive crew, could not delete my enemies and also fell behind on the scoring game.

The core game will reward deleteing your enemies, but how much does it take for you to do it is what will make the difference. I, for example, enjoy versatile crews that can kill some enemies but can run around them and score if needed. Mobility and durability have given me more victories than going fully for the kill, but having the resources to delete one or two enemy pieces without too much hussle is something I almost never regret doing. Denying a player of one of his scheme runners since turn 1 or 2 and only spending one activation in doing so is a very rewarding thing to do. It can be a game changer and force the opponent to rethink their game plan. On the other hand, as I do not trust my luck, I tend to search for objectives that may be done without flipping cards at all, making extremely slippery and mobile crews that can run around my enemy without having to face them directly.

Today, at my community, that is not particularly competitive, I do not see the rewards for killing an issue on the game, but I can totally understand that, in certaing matchups it can be a big issue. Facing an opponent that can simply delete you from the map in two turns while your whole crew consists of non-offensive fragile models, it can result in an NPE for someone that wanted to focus on scoring and faced so much pressure it was not an interesting game.

[Flib Jib]

On 7/25/2023 at 4:16 PM, aquenaton said:

The changes on the charge action have also made killing harder to avoid, as the hitter can walk and charge into my scheme runner, while in the past, the threat range tended to be smaller. A scheme runner was able to leave behind potential dangers with 2AP, and would be able to scheme one turn later. Right now, the "area denial" of a hitter is twice it's movement (if generalizing) in stead of just once as it was (generally) on m2e.

I completely agree.  In addition, I think I actually like the change where models that were engaged at activation cannot scheme during their activation. (I wonder what would have happened if it were a general condition that models gained when breaking engagement; something like "After this model breaks engagement gain Flustered. Flustered: while this model has flustered it cannot take interact actions. End this condition during End Phase" Might have been a fun way to boost condition removal models.

 

[Flib Jib]

On 7/25/2023 at 11:00 AM, Adran said:

Overall I think the current edition is the most killy version of malifaux we have seen so far. This is a mixture of threat ranges, consistency in damage and most importantly, the scoring system that is currently in use. In the current game  37.5% (3/8)of your points can only be scored on the last turn. Whilst it is possible that some of the actions required to score these points can be done earlier in the game, most of the time, those actions can still be undone. Its certainly the only edition I haven't yet won a game despite being wiped out. 

I play in the UK where tournament events are almost always large enough that the positions are decide on tie breakers, either VP scored or points difference, both of which are not normally good if you focus too much on the denial game. So you might regually win all 3 rounds by killing everything your opponent has, but often come 3rd because at least 2 other people also won all rounds and scored better because they were less focused on killing. (assuming 17+ entrants which is common)

Love the math! regarding tournament play I wonder how much is factored when considering "Ideal/practical" What I mean is that Ideally you hope that tournaments go a certain amount of rounds for the Swiss system to dichotomize once and that tiebreakers result from outliers and not because the system wasn't completed. however, practically speaking anything more than 4 rounds (a 16-player system) is unrealistic. so tiebreakers are less breaking ties rather could be interpreted as the ranking mechanic. which is a WHOOOOLE other topic. 

On 7/25/2023 at 4:16 PM, aquenaton said:

Your example on tournaments is very interesting, as it may seem that a game focused on killing is a game with less points that one that is focused on scoring. That way, on a tournament, you may end up winning all your games but place lower than players that focus on  scoring, but on a 1v1 game, against a rival, killing MAY give you the victory. Of course, there is no "right path". I have faced Colette, for example, and she could trample my McMourning team without killing my models while scoring perfectly, and I, who had a more agressive crew, could not delete my enemies and also fell behind on the scoring game.

Another side topic that might be fun and I've seen in the past before. Are crews "balanced" for a >5-turn game? I remember in 2E there were some Super OP crews that dominated the first two maybe three turns but then fizzled out. So there were meta's that took into account many tourny games not finishing the full 5 rounds. I don't think balancing decisions should  take this into consideration but balance for how games are intended. still festinating to think about though.

[Flib Jib]

On 7/24/2023 at 10:24 AM, SEV said:

I don't understand your point. Killing is a core mechanic of Malifaux. It's a skirmish wargame after all...

So true, and when compared against all the other options out there Malifaux is far less '2 dimensional' or only killy than it's competition. Which is why I love it. I just sometimes wonder why  Bad Things Happen.