Still struggling with "Master of Malifaux"

[Q'iq'el]

I'm trying to get all the rules I still have problems with straight tonight and "Master of Malifaux" is causing me no end of troubles.

I've read this thread in the "Resolved Rules Questions" forums and it still doesn't help me.

The rule has two parts:

1. This model ignores hazardous, severe and water terrain when moving.

I understand hazardous and severe, but why is there any need to mention water?

If I understand Terrain rules from the page 85 properly, the water itself does not affect normal models at all. Some of the models have special rules giving them bonuses or penalties in the water - Lilith is not one of them.

If an aquatic terrain feature has extra effects, ignoring "hazardous" and "severe" terrain deals with those (for example a shallow river is a "area, severe, water" terrain according to the example, and some treacherous mountain river could perhaps be "area, severe, hazardous, water" - either way, Lilith doesn't care).

I suppose it is just redundant, but I feel I may be missing something. Can anyone think of an example where ignoring water would actually help her?

Secondly, do I understand correctly that charging is a "movement" action and as such is covered by this part of the rule as well?

2. The second part of the rule has been explained in the thread I've linked to, but I don't get the explanation and I don't understand the issue. Probably because I've joined the game after the errata has already been published and haven't played her before (so telling me how things have changed does not explain things really. ).

It says: "This model ignores cover when drawing LoS".

a) Covering terrain is a characteristic of terrain which makes it give (soft) or & Armour 1 (hard) when resolving ranged strike duel or casting duels with spells. (page 84)

If I understand correctly that happens only when the LOS can be drawn to the target and if the target is up to 2x the height of the covering terrain. If these two conditions are met, the target has "cover" (soft or hard).

If so, in the first place, how can Lilith ignore cover at all, when drawing LoS, when the "cover" is something models receive when you have LoS to them?!?

What is that entry supposed to cause?

- Lilith does not have any spell whatsoever that would allow for a soft or hard cover penalty to her casting flip.

- Charge does require LoS, but when you Strike after the charge, the attack is melee so it doesn't give any soft or hard cover penalty to her attack flip, does it?

- Fences and such (ht1 so that she can see above them) would require her to spend 2" to cross them when charging. But it's not because they are "covering" but because of their height. This is not "severe" or "hazardous", never mind "water", characteristic, so she cannot ignore it.

- If the terrain element or area terrain is ht2 and her target is same or lower ht, she can't see it anyway, so she can't draw LoS. There is no hard or soft cover and again it's the height of the terrain that prevents her from seeing the target, not its "covering" characteristic. In other words, she can't ignore terrain, even "covering terrain" to charge things she doesn't see.

What exactly is the purpose of ignoring "cover" when drawing LoS.

Can somebody give me an example of a gameplay situation, where this entry comes into play?

Thanks in advice.

Edited May 17, 2010 by Q'iq'el

[Sliver Chocobo]

Part 1 can be useful in many sistuations, as long there is lots of terrain.

Part 2 the only usefull effect that i can see come from this charging through a forest (as i understand forest limit LOS (i could be be wrong, i havn't played with any forests yet)

So to conclude the more forest the better

[Q'iq'el]

Part 1 can be useful in many sistuations, as long there is lots of terrain.

That is clear, but what about "water". What does ignoring "wather" helps her?!

Part 2 the only usefull effect that i can see come from this charging through a forest (as i understand forest limit LOS (i could be be wrong, i havn't played with any forests yet)

So to conclude the more forest the better

Forest is "obscuring", according to the errata, which is different characteristic than "covering.". The "soft cover" characteristic has been removed altogether from the example on the page 85.

"Obscuring" gives "soft cover" to the models within the area terrain, and it blocks LoS if there is more than 3" (not stacking) of the obscuring terrain between the caster and the target.

Lilith cannot ignore it at all, because all she ignores when drawing LoS is "cover" (not even "covering terrain", if you are really strict in the way you read the rules).

In other words, as far as I can see, if there is more than 3" of woods or other obscuring terrain between Lilith and her target, she cannot see it and she cannot charge it or cast spells such as Transposition at it.

[tenabrae]

Water will usually be severe terrain (a shallow stream is suggested as severe, sever terrain lists mud as an example and walking in a pond is at least as hard as mud).

Don't forget players designate the terrain, there's no hard and fast rules... if you want your water to be climbable, just say it's so

[Q'iq'el]

Water will usually be severe terrain (a shallow stream is suggested as severe, sever terrain lists mud as an example and walking in a pond is at least as hard as mud).

Don't forget players designate the terrain, there's no hard and fast rules... if you want your water to be climbable, just say it's so

Well, I can imagine a beautiful waterfall feature that could be climbable, water and severe... and perhaps even hazardous.

In such case Lilith ignores "severe" and "hazardous" characteristics... she would also ignore the fact it is "water" but she wouldn't ignore the "climbable" characteristic.

She'd still have to climb it like anyone else, just faster and with no risk involved.

Either way, if she didn't ignore "water" characteristic, it would still be the same.

It seems to me, ignoring "water" is completely irrelevant, because "water" itself does nothing for her ("water" affects only specific models, like Silurid).

The problem is, as far as I see it, that all the bad effects of water that may affect it come from characteristics different than water.

if for example I introduce my own terrain characteristic and call it "neverborn-melting", and then put two vats of "acid" and label it as "water", "severe", "hazardous", "neverborn-melting"... she will ignore the first three characteristics, but it will still melt her.

I.E. I can't think of any use for it.

Actually Silurids are great material for comparison. Silurids' Amphibious rule adds +2WK and tells the player to ignore all the movement penalties from water terrain.

That means if the water is severe, or even climbable terrain, they will still ignore any movement penalties coming from that piece of terrain, because it's also water.

Lilith's "Master of Malifaux" isn't worded that way. She doesn't ignore movement penalties coming from other characteristics of "watery" terrain, she ignores "severe", "hazardous" and "water" specifically. Right?

If a given piece of "water" is a magic water-wall ht3 or a climbable waterfall, Master of Malifaux will do nothing for her - she will treat the feature as if it wasn't water, but she'll still be delayed by it.

Edited May 17, 2010 by Q'iq'el

[ProdigalPunk]

1) The water is more for special home brewed things then anything else I would imagine. Say I have a giant river running through my board and my opponent and myself decide we want there to be a strong current with it, so we are going to say ever 2'' moved across it the river moves the model 1'' down stream, or swimming up the river costs 3'' per one actual inch moved, then I would argue she ignores those effects.

2) The second part does nothing currently. But lets say in the future Chameleon Men are introduced and they have an ability called Camo that says "Models may not draw LOS to Chameleon Men while they are affected by soft or hard cover" well gratz you can ignore that. Secondly if they want to give other models Master of Malifaux or have models that can steal it from her, and these models have ranged attacks it will come in handy.

[Ropetus]

I think one instance where this might come up is the Sabertooth Cerberus and Stalker: the Cerberus gets to push 6" at the end of the turn when it has cover from all enemies. Lilith's Master of Malifaux means the cat has to have LoS blocked from her instead of just cover.

-Ropetus

[Hookers]

i'm also kind of curious about these questions.

i think at some point water might've had more of an effect. essentially when you say a river is severe terrain you are saying the ground underneath it is severe. but i think you are correct, right now it doesn't do very much.

for the second one i think it was changed to tone lilith down. it probably does affect some rare circumstances and might affect things in the future, as ropetus and prodigalpunk mentioned, but i wouldn't be too concerned on their usefulness. lilith isn't paying "too much" for abilities like that and she has more than enough to make her useful in tons of situations without them.

[Aldyhide]

Water will usually be severe terrain (a shallow stream is suggested as severe, sever terrain lists mud as an example and walking in a pond is at least as hard as mud).

Don't forget players designate the terrain, there's no hard and fast rules... if you want your water to be climbable, just say it's so

Why did I just get a picture of Lilith running up a waterfall?

Anyway, there will probably be some new terrain rules released along with Book 2 that address this. After all it isn't like the developers to add something if it has no purpose.