How to Stop Being Bad with Ramos

[CorpT]

I just picked up the game and have never played a minis game before. That being said, I'm continuously getting stomped with Ramos. I don't think the issue is Ramos at all, but I'd like some ideas about how to best use him against different armies.

So far, I've played 3 games against 3 different armies. The first against Rasputina was a pretty ugly affair where I couldn't get any objectives accomplished and mostly spent my turns wandering around trying to engage without being destroyed in the process.

The second was against Viktoria. In that one I tried to be more aggressive and go for more schemes but couldn't manage to get anything done. I had my army spread out too much and they tended to get picked off. Again accomplished zero objectives. A sniper proceeded to destroy almost everything of mine.

The third was against Gremlins. Trying to learn from mistakes, I kept my spiders clumped together so they could form up into Swarms easier. And was promptly decimated by something that did 3 damage to everything in 6 inches.

So I'm at a point where I am looking for some specific ideas and strategies.

1) What schemes do you pick? Why? Do you announce?

2) How do you use specific units? My main tactic has been to get individual spiders close to their units, out activate them so that I go last, then form up into a swarm and make a big attack with the swarm. Clearly this is not working. How should I be using them?

3) What abilities do you use most on Ramos? How do you deal with having very difficult to activate spells? How do you manage your cards? Do you save all Tomes for activations? How many Soulstones do you start with? What do you use them for?

4) How do you use your other characters? Joss? Alyce? Johan? Are they worth getting or not?

My typical army has been something like this:

1 Ramos

1 Joss

1 Swarm

4 Arachnid

1 Brass Arachnid

5 Soulstones

So far it's been pretty frustrating as everything I learn from the last encounter proves to be the complete opposite in the next one. How well do you have to know your opponent's army to do well against them? Is there a better way to learn to play a decent game?

[Buck Dog]

I don't play Ramos so I can't offer too much advice, but from what I understand, he can be a hard master to get to grips with, but once you have his tactics right, he is one of the best - so stick with it !!

A few general points...

How much terrain are you playing with ? It sounds like you are getting picked off by a lot of ranged attacks and spells. Malifaux is a terrain heavy game, so make sure you have enough of it to provide plenty of cover.

Also, I would read up on some of the opposing crews that you will be playing against so you know what to look out for. Gremlins have a lot of blast effects, so it is never a good idea to go too bunch up against them. Also, don't forget that your spiders have evasive to help against the blasts.

[TimeLapse]

Okay well Ramos is one of my fav masters and like you I do not run the steamborg in my list so we have soo much in common I thought I would comment on your games.

First off black dog is right, your spiders have "evasive 3" witch means that they take 3 less damage from blasts, auras and pulse based damage, this is added to there armor, so they would only take one damage from AoE damage of 5 or less, only 2 from an aoe damage of 6 and so on. So the blast of 3 damage should have only given each one wound not three.

Next shooty lists will always be an issue but you have a good defense in Arcing screen, both your totem and Ramos should be casting this spell, it gives everything df+2 even if you are not in melee combat that is good because it incress your base df. A normal spider is at DF 8 with Arcing screen in effect. And if your totem casts it, then Ramos can get it as well.

Okay now for your direct questions

1) Schemes for a slow army can be tricky, For Ramos I almost always announce Bodyguard, with his own armor 2 he is a tough nut to kill. Hold out may work as well, but I see most players using Ramos’s "Do I have to do everything myself" Scheme since it does not state that it has to be an enemy model, what you do is kill your own spiders with both his attacks and gain the points, you even get scrap counters to rebuild them yourself, its an easy way to get your points. Think defencive with these note you speed of your models and the limited range of arcing screen makes you want your opponents to come to you.

4) I play with rusty Alyce, The two cards plus her clockwork seeker is great, when getting the two cards you will be cast stoke easier. I also once and awhile will through in Johan, only if I think I need some extra range, he is great with Ramos but not really needed most of the time, this is my typical 35SS list

Ramos

B.A. 2ss

Rusty Alyce 10ss

Gunsmith 6ss (Or the convict gunslinger)

Steampunk Spider 3ss

Steampunk Spider 3ss

Steampunk Spider 3ss

Steampunk Spider 3ss

Steampunk Spider 3ss

3,2) spiders are interesting and I fill my list with them as well, if you pick defense Schemes like hold out and body guard then I would see if your opponent will come to you, you can sit back and use Ramos to make more spiders, if you do this his activation so look like this,

(2) Salvage under fire

(0) construct spider, then draw a card from surge

(1) arcing screen (and possibly another surge card draw)

Use the brass A. to stock and cast Arching screen himself, if you do this you can keep up your defense incase he is able to get long range shoots at you. If your opponent has no range then you might make movement actions with Ramos and the Brass A instead. Now with Rusty Alyce in the mix her extra cards plus the possible surges may produce the cards you need to stoke with, if so stoke Ramos and do the same thing over again - the arcing screen since he will not need that cast twice in the same turn.

Next for the spiders! I tend to send them out in groups of four as I make them, though I like to leave 3 or more next to Ramos at all times as a defense. As the game goes on Ramos will not need to make his (2) Salvage under fire since he will have scrap counters from destroyed spiders, if you do then start moving him some to get closer to these Scrap counters so that he can use them to make more spiders. Ramos has some good attacking spells but if he keeps up arcing screen and is making as many spiders as he can he is doing his job.

Now the spiders moving up and reforming tactic is a good one don’t lose faith in it, Keep them bunched up, remember when you place the swarm its has to be in base contact with at lest one spider, so march your spiders up in a line and have the final spider move once so that he is touching the others and summon the swarm at the other end, leaving it one ap from the last spider to get at lest one move in or an extra attack.

Remember that swarms have a free healing flip as a zero action; if they have any wounds on them always take it. Also always remember that swarms damage flips are always +1 when your wounds are above 4, so if you charge with them they will get a +2 to there damage flips.

If your opponent is willing to come to you then keep your spiders in Arcing screen range, the +2 to defense is great and the fact that if they hit you they take 2 wounds is great. (Remember that if a model wds its different then when it damages, damages are effected by things like armor where Wds (wounds) are not, so even if they have 4 armor they still will take 2 wounds from arcing screen. That is why it is soo important to have lots of spiders and have both Ramos and the totem cast it. Ramos with arcing screen becomes DF 4 and will wound anyone hitting him!

So in summery,

1st Arcing screen is your best friend always cast it unless it has no chance of being used in that turn.

2nd always try and create a spider, each turn, Linked in so an okay 0 action but I never use it unless I am desperate.

3rd I would use Rusty Alyce over Joss, but I don’t think Joss is bad, I just like Alyce more.

4th Spiders swarm and unswarm move is good, you just need to practice it more and keep them as long as possible in the arcing screen.

5th, Choose defensive Schemes, this will make your opponent come to you and you can then fight without having to move so you can make more spiders and keep thinks in arcing screens.

And on top of that if you are back making more models then your opponent will want to get to you faster to try and stop you from making more things then he can deal with.

On a side note ember that Arachnid allows spiders to travel faster when climbing so if there is a wall you may climb it instead of walking next to or around it for a boost in speed.

Hope this helps,

-Andrew

Edited November 15, 2010 by TimeLapse
spelling and making it more readable

[HopelessHeretic]

1. Bodyguard is not bad but with the -1vp on it I tend to stay away. Ramos' scheme (do I have to do everything myself) looks really tough until you realize that he can kill his own units to achieve it so I usually start off by using electric fire on one of my spiders (making sure you land on week damage) then hitting it with a fist strike to kill it then just summoning it back. I also like hold out against slower factions.

2. Ramos has really two general play styles and they are entirely based on his two totems. If you take the brass arachnid

your strategy should boil down to getting a card that lets you stoke and then reactivate a model in such a way that it cripples your opponent or lets you achieve your strategy. When using this tactic it is important not to leave that unit unsupported. The second is to use the brass arachnid to constantly surge so that you always have an amazing hand and have Ramos' spells easily going off.

If I take the brass arachnid I usually go very spider heavy. A reactivating swarm can essentially reactivate twice since they inherit all effects and reactivate stays on until the end phase. If you go this route I heavily recommend Alyce since she will give you more cards and as a result you are way more likely to draw a card to stoke with.

A common mistake with Ramos is to keep him far away from the fight when in actuality you want him about 3"-7" from the thick of it. This way he can support his units. Common Ramos tricks are creating an electrical creation to do direct damage. Controlled detonating a spider then re-summoning it.

3. I always save any tomes between 10-5 for his activation in hopes of making spiders or electrical creations or spiders unless I am running the tool kit. I mange card largely based on triggers.

If I running the brass arachnid then my list looks like this.

Brass 2

Alyce 10

5 spiders 15

Large spider 5

5 stone cache (unless you take corphee I would recommend against more than 5 stones)

Cards are managed by saving all tomes (except 13-11) for Ramos, Rams for Alyce, Crows for spiders, and mask for defensive cheating.

4. I would only recommend Joss in a list with the toolkit so you can give him the tomes but he is a power house just don't over extend him. Alyce is amazing 2 more cards, head shot on a ram with rapid fire, and can use Ramos' cast she is well worth her 10 points. I don't particularly care for johan as he is only really good at protecting Ramos and Alyce does that and more.

Hope this helps.

-Heretic

[TimeLapse]

So far it's been pretty frustrating as everything I learn from the last encounter proves to be the complete opposite in the next one. How well do you have to know your opponent's army to do well against them? Is there a better way to learn to play a decent game?

One thing you will learn in this game is that each master plays the game in a diferent way, so once you understand witch master you are playing (and what they do) you will learn how to tweek your army to face that master, as they will you. This sadly is something that is only really learned in game because you have to take in not only what masters do but how the other player plays, is he defensive or is he a balls out attacker, it really does change how you deploy and what you bring in most lists. But Ramos can get away with having a core list, The list i posted earlier is the list I normally play.

But as you see from my post Im a defensive player,

When you focus on attacking then you really need to know how your opponent works and adapt to it, but if you are defending then they have to adapt to you and you have an upper hand with Ramos a master I see vary much as a defensive master.

Something else i did not post before, if I face the ortagas or other lists with long range shooters I will add Hans from time to time to mix things up. Hans, Alyce and a gunsmith would be a good source for shooters in a Ramos lists, where Ramos hides behind something and starts mass producing spiders.

As you can see I can be long winded about this subject I love ramos that much.

Feel free to ask any more questions and Ill go into more detail on them from my point of view.

I hope this helps

-Andrew Haught

[hippieshopper]

If I take the brass arachnid I usually go very spider heavy. A reactivating swarm can essentially reactivate twice since they inherit all effects and reactivate stays on until the end phase. If you go this route I heavily recommend Alyce since she will give you more cards and as a result you are way more likely to draw a card to stoke with.

How can they reactivate twice?

This sounds like a helluva combo, I just don't see it.

4. I would only recommend Joss in a list with the toolkit so you can give him the tomes but he is a power house just don't over extend him. Alyce is amazing 2 more cards, head shot on a ram with rapid fire, and can use Ramos' cast she is well worth her 10 points. I don't particularly care for johan as he is only really good at protecting Ramos and Alyce does that and more.

The toolkit only gives a Tome to the Cast statistic and Joss has no spells that I am aware of.

I don't mean to sound rude, I am just starting Mr. Ramos myself and I am feeling a bit confused.

One thing you will learn in this game is that each master plays the game in a diferent way, so once you understand witch master you are playing (and what they do) you will learn how to tweek your army to face that master, as they will you. This sadly is something that is only really learned in game because you have to take in not only what masters do but how the other player plays, is he defensive or is he a balls out attacker, it really does change how you deploy and what you bring in most lists. But Ramos can get away with having a core list, The list i posted earlier is the list I normally play.

But as you see from my post Im a defensive player,

When you focus on attacking then you really need to know how your opponent works and adapt to it, but if you are defending then they have to adapt to you and you have an upper hand with Ramos a master I see vary much as a defensive master.

Something else i did not post before, if I face the ortagas or other lists with long range shooters I will add Hans from time to time to mix things up. Hans, Alyce and a gunsmith would be a good source for shooters in a Ramos lists, where Ramos hides behind something and starts mass producing spiders.

As you can see I can be long winded about this subject I love ramos that much.

Feel free to ask any more questions and Ill go into more detail on them from my point of view.

I hope this helps

-Andrew Haught

I really appreciate the help, I know I am not the intended target for it but just reading this made me think about trying him.

He seems a lot like the mechanical Nico, and I am pretty fair with Nico, so I thought I would try him out.

[HopelessHeretic]

@Hippieshopper: How spiders reactivate twice is as follows.

Brass stokes a spider

spider activates

spider activates again and uses its second AP to swarm together. Since this is a replace effect two thing happen. One the swarm continues it activation use the highest AP of the spiders swarming together. Two it inherits all effects since reactivate is and effect. The rule of a model may not reactivate multiple times does not apply since it is a new model.

Sorry for the miss communication on the Joss thing I meant that the totem would give Ramos the tome and then you would not have to spend the cards with tomes on Ramos. Instead you could use them on Joss.

I hope you try Ramos he plays like nothing else in miniatures gaming.

-Heretic

[Vlad the Mad]

So far, I've played 3 games against 3 different armies. The first against Rasputina was a pretty ugly affair where I couldn't get any objectives accomplished and mostly spent my turns wandering around trying to engage without being destroyed in the process.

The second was against Viktoria. In that one I tried to be more aggressive and go for more schemes but couldn't manage to get anything done. I had my army spread out too much and they tended to get picked off. Again accomplished zero objectives. A sniper proceeded to destroy almost everything of mine.

The third was against Gremlins. Trying to learn from mistakes, I kept my spiders clumped together so they could form up into Swarms easier. And was promptly decimated by something that did 3 damage to everything in 6 inches.

I'm not a Ramos player, nor have I played against him yet, so I will skip any Ramos advice as there are other people who can help you better with that.

However, from the three games you described above, I can tell you that you do need to know a bit more about you opponents. "Know thy enemy." - it is true for Malifaux as it for all other completive games.

You don't necessarily need to know all their cards by heart to play better games, but knowing some of the key mechanisms of their crews and models will radically improve your chances of winning.

[CorpT]

This is really great information. Thanks everyone! I'm going to try some of these things out and report back. I really like the idea of using the stoke on the spider. That looks really good. I may need to practice with some detonations and killing my own guys too.

Thanks again!

[Nirvanawn]

He is trying to beat up on my gremlins. Just watch out when pulling my finger.

[hippieshopper]

Yeah, Som'er needs more fiber in his diet.

We had a discussion on this earlier...my friend and I. It seems one of the more effective ways to do things is by the use of many baby spiders, and few heavy hitters....most notably being "Thuh Klump" or the swarm of baby spiders.

I'm not saying this is the absolute best way with no possible flaws, this is just something that works well with my play style.

That being Quantity > Quality.

[kbdrand]

Have you run that by a rules Marshall? I don't believe that is correct. Once reactivate is used by the model the effect is basically gone so i do not believe it applies to the swarm, but I could be mistaken.

@Hippieshopper: How spiders reactivate twice is as follows.

Brass stokes a spider

spider activates

spider activates again and uses its second AP to swarm together. Since this is a replace effect two thing happen. One the swarm continues it activation use the highest AP of the spiders swarming together. Two it inherits all effects since reactivate is and effect. The rule of a model may not reactivate multiple times does not apply since it is a new model.

Sorry for the miss communication on the Joss thing I meant that the totem would give Ramos the tome and then you would not have to spend the cards with tomes on Ramos. Instead you could use them on Joss.

I hope you try Ramos he plays like nothing else in miniatures gaming.

-Heretic

[Nirvanawn]

Stop giving him hints. He will start kicking my butt.

[dakrulz55]

i think the re-activation effect ends when your done with the second activation. since your swarming together during the second activation the effects of reactivate havent expired so it carries over to the swarm, at least i think so.

[kbdrand]

I asked the Rules Marshalls about this and the official ruling is that the effect carries over, but it carries over as already being used so the swarm would not get to use plus it could not be the target of another reactivate.

[Buck Dog]

I don't have the rules to hand, but I think if three spiders swarm together and one of them has had reactivate cast on it and has not activated that turn, then the newly formed swarm can activate and reactivate. From reading various Leveticus threads, I think thats how it works with SPA's anyway; I've yet to put it into practice !

[HopelessHeretic]

I have not asked since this summer but this was allowed at the last scrap at gen con.

I believe when effects transfer you gain them, so reactivate is reset. Or if there was an alp nearby and one of the spiders was slow it would trip his ability. I could of course be wrong.

Or

I believe that the only rules about reactivate are that it goes away after the second activation and that a model can't receive more than once a turn. And since the spider swarm is a new model it hasn't reactivated.

Either way. The best way to use it is to actually have another spider do the swarm together.

1. Give a spider reactivate

2. Spider uses 2 AP

3. A different spider uses one AP then swarms together. The swarm has full action points and since the reactivated spider has yet to reactivate it has full AP and an unused reactivate.

-Heretic

[Doctor Amos]

Surprisingly little love for the Excecutioner? He's one of the top three melee models in book one (Mature Nephilim and Killjoy being the other two). I guess spiders are trickier, sure, but...

Then again, I don't have any Arcanist masters (yet) so maybe they just value tricky over killy.

[Darkcloud]

what about the new totem mobile toolkit? anyone played it? I think it looks like agood option but i don't play Ramos (not yet) and maybe brass arachnid is better?

[Lorenz]

mobile tool kit makes it very easy to always get surge trigger and do just about any of his spells with out much effort. that being said if you are using the brass arachnid you have a harder time using your spells but you can reactivate each round if you save the correct cards in your fate hand but that means you can reactivate any of your constructs with the brass arachnid and also heal your constructs in the same turn

[Uncle]

what about the new totem mobile toolkit? anyone played it? I think it looks like agood option but i don't play Ramos (not yet) and maybe brass arachnid is better?

To be honest, I see no reason to run the Brass Arachnid over the Mobile Tookit (well, unless 1 soulstone is a deal breaker). The Toolkit turns Ramos into a summoning machine, triggers Surge on all his other spells, both of which are more valuable, in my mind, than giving out Reactivate (assuming you have high Tomes in hand).

I can see situations in which you'd want the Brass Arachnid over the Toolkit, but I just don't see those situations cropping up often enough to make it a valid choice.