Countering The Dreamer

[Alondir]

Hello fokes at Wyrd I recently picked up my Dreamer crew an played my 1st few games last night, and tbh the experisice was dampened abit by my gaming club thinking the Dreamer is now the most OP master ever invented in the history of ever.

My list was at 35ss:

Dreamer 7ss

Alps x5 15ss

Coppelius 9ss

Stitched Together x1 5ss

Daydreams x2 4ss

My tactics in the game I was playing was hit and run against a Kiri crew, mainly using my stitched as an amazing body guard for the Dreamer and keeping up fog so my oponent struggled to get counter charges into my alps/coppelius. And using my daydreams to get models out of harms way before a counter attack came my way.

I was just wondering if anyone can think of particular counters to the Dreamer, mainly for my Local gaming club, cos i wanna keep playing the dreamer but if they hate me for it. Well it would make it a bit boring for me and them.

Mainly for Levi, Kiri, Perdita, Showgirls. but any sugestions are welcome, for any crews/combos.

[Ratty]

Kirai could try taking a Rotten Belle and Hanged so she can strip the Dreamer of his entourage.

[tadaka]

I could see that having limited effects given once fog is up they cant target them any more. Not saying its useless but limited.

Was the result I had when trying this.

That being said it works a lot better for mcmorning.

[hippieshopper]

I never had a problem with them.

I went against them as McM and he dropped his guys on a pack of my Punk Zombies....that did not fare well for him.

Sliced and Diced twice...killed my own guy in the process but as a Slow to Die action, I did it again...all that was left was the Dreamer who high tailed it and met his fate at the hands of Sebs and that nasty bone saw.

[tadaka]

I dont mean to be a jerk but sounds like the other guy did not know how to play dreamer.

Normal dump effect would have chomp on your head who can activate before you have a chance to hit him. Then he is put away still before you can swing back. First rule of dreamer is not to leave chomp on the table to get hit. Second Most dreamer players leave at least 1 model back to guard the dreamer.

Any one who drops his crew on your head and does nothing but die had very bad luck or new to dreamer.

Also means you pulled 3 8 or higher masks. Thats some very solid luck.

[karn987]

The Dreamer is a hard fight. He is all about positioning and glass cannons basically.

So when dealing with him, you really have to change how you fight the battle. Kinda like how you have to tweak your style against Pandora to stand a chance. The dreamer obviously loves to drop on you and do hit and runs. So Slow to Die models are a great choice for this because Nightmares are fragile! Let me say it again, Nightmares are Fragile. If you hit them, they will die rather quickly. All with the exception of Stitched Together who is a pain in the ass =D

For Stitched Together, either bite the bullet and kill him and deal with Does Not Die (Try paralyzing him, it will cancel out his reactivate). Also Sacrificing them would be another good thing because Does Not Die only works when they are killed and not Sac'ed.

Nightmares don't leave Corpse Counters so Ressers can not go in expecting to gain more counters. You have to bring what you need from the get go.

Honestly, the general fact of the matter is that the Dreamer will get the drop on you. He is fast, faster then almost any other crew (only a few in certain situations can keep up with him). So you may want to build a crew to brace for impact. Let him drop on you and then kill his models for doing it. You gotta protect your masters or have a decent hand and some SS ready to hold of LCB. Base Block him and make sure he can't get you within his massie 3" reach! A smart Dreamer player will be very leary about a solid formation and Slow to Die models.

As always, AE's do very very well against him if you can keep them safe from his initial drops. Also models that explode when they die are another decent choice to.

Against the crew you listed well... he is going Alp abuse, which is a bit cheesy to be honest but easy to deal with. One solid AE and they are all dead. Pile on hte AE's and bring tough models. Your almost assured to get hit first, so you better be able to take it.

Levy can take him down if you bring the right Constructs/Undead. Samaurai Punks are a good idea. As are Guardians as LCB and crew are bad at breaking high armor. Levy's vanilla Models work very well to as they will wreck the crew if they hit. So things like Ashes and Dust and the ENgine are great. I would avoid Alyce because she is to easy for him ot kill. The hardest part is keeping Levy and his Waifs safe to res him. You really gotta use terrain to keep you safe.

For Kirai, I'm surprised he had trouble with the Dreamer. Kriai is one of the Masters who has a decent chance against him. She is annoyingly hard to kill and her spirits are honestly, stupidly tough at times. You just have to keep Kirai safe and be ready to use your movement combos to catch him once he drops.

Perdita is in a bit of a pickle. Take high armor models and slow to die ones and just hope you can survive his attacks because he should be hitting you first. I would try really hard to take out his daydreams as your a good master for doing that and daydreams are a huge key to him.

Showgirls have it rough because they are fast but fragile. They have some really high Df models but they are also rather easy to kill once you get ahold of them. They have to use their speed and tricks to try and keep him back and go for objectives more then anything I htink.

So some key points:

• Kill Daydreams ASAP. They are the key to his manuverability and will be the end of you if you dont get them.
  
• Don't obsess over LCB to much because that will be easily used against you. You have to worry about the entire crew and if you did bullet 1, you only have to worry about 1 point of entry for his crew, the Dreamer.
  
• Base block like you mean it. Limit hte locations he can bring models in on and use overlapping fields of fire and threat ranges to discourage his appearance.
  
• Slow to Die models are his bane because Nightmares are not tough.
  
• When he drops multiple Nightmares, use blasts and AE's to finish them off asap. You need to fight hte swarm fast of they will overwhelm you easily.
  
• The Dreamer played right is very very slippery. But if you can paralyze him, he is screwed beyond all else. Go for this. Paralyze which ever part is out and then just beat on the crew as hard as you can.
  
• Ranged focused lists generally have a hard time with him. If you focus more on melee and long reach melee models you can do rather well.
  
• A two wave style of fighting works well. Half the crew moves ahead and essentially baits him while the other half stays a bit behind and gets ready to save the first half when they get dropped on.
  

Hope this helps!

[Vlad the Mad]

Mainly for Levi, Kiri, Perdita, Showgirls. but any sugestions are welcome, for any crews/combos.

Nothing really constructive to add to here (I think Karn has most of it covered), but I think you should tell your friends not to complain too much about OP masters, as they are playing quite powerful masters themselves.

[hippieshopper]

I usually get a lot of high masks and tomes and never the crows I need.

I think of it as some really twisted payback.

I also think that if I ever went Neverborn or Arcanist that I would start seeing the cards I want for summoning.

He did, he had the oogie boogie thing watching him and he tried to gamble Sebs and got a low number and cheated away half his health when Sebs Harvested them.

But yes, he was a newbie. It was his 4th game and he'd never gone against MCM before.

[Dolomyte]

Killing the dreamer is a good way to mess with the army. load up on blast damage to deal with the alps.

[tadaka]

Wow you can hit the dreamer? Must know some thing I don't I cant ever manager to touch the kid unless the crew is dead. BTW thanks karn for that guide local player read it and is now officially a menace to malifaux.

[Alondir]

bump. wanna help my friends out who else can think of counters?

[Vlad the Mad]

In principle I'd advise against splitting your force too much against the Dreamer. As others have already said, Nightmares will usually get to hit first, but will not last long if there is anything left to hit back - small groups of enemies make the best target for the Dreamer's Hit&Run crew. They can be used as bait though, like Karn already mentioned.

With Levy I'd play Crooked Man for blast damage and area denial through Shafted markers. Belles can be used to Lure the bodyguard away from the Dreamer if there is no Teddy present.

The Ortegas might have a problem as they usually won't be able to get enough shots off before the Nightmares are in melee. As general advice I'd say play it patiently, focus on your objectives and be ready to sacrifice a some models to achieve your goal. Papa Loco could eliminate all those Alps in one turn easily,if he was in the right place.

I'd also like to second that taking out the Daydreams as soon as possible will largely improve your chances of success.

[oozeboss]

"1 ... 1 Dreamer! Bwah ha ha ha - I luff to count! ..."

(Oh - Counter - oops! Got that wrong.)

The easiest way to Counter The Dreamer is to make sure that I'm the one running them!

:elefant::elefant::elefant::elefant::elefant:

(5 ... 5 Elephants!!!!!)

[anathema]

Is there a definite answer on how Shadowy form works then? My little guy keeps getting melee range sniped by people positioning to only have him in their melee range.

[Wodschow]

Is there a definite answer on how Shadowy form works then? My little guy keeps getting melee range sniped by people positioning to only have him in their melee range.

They cannot do that.

You can target every model within LoS and only then do you measure to see if they're in range.

Ie. if an enemy is in base contact with the Dreamer and there's a Nightmare 2" away from both the enemy and the Dreamer and the enemy only have a 1" range he'd still have to target the Nightmare, but the Nightmare is not in range so he cannot Strike it.

Made a list of ways to get to the Dreamer even when he's surrounded by Nightmares, and trust me it is a fairly short list.

[Ratty]

They cannot do that.

You can target every model within LoS and only then do you measure to see if they're in range.

Ie. if an enemy is in base contact with the Dreamer and there's a Nightmare 2" away from both the enemy and the Dreamer and the enemy only have a 1" range he'd still have to target the Nightmare, but the Nightmare is not in range so he cannot Strike it.

Made a list of ways to get to the Dreamer even when he's surrounded by Nightmares, and trust me it is a fairly short list.

I know you have said this before, and it is very possibly right. However I don't remember (and can't find in my search of the 2 threads on this subject) us ever getting a response back on how it's meant to work.

I would have probably have ruled it the other way after similar issues in other games (Warplightning cannons being charged by units that can't possibly reach them first turn, and therefore dying).

[Wodschow]

I think it's fairly straightforward from how the rules are written.

Even the headline for the relevant paragraph on the relevant page (Book154) says:

Declare Target, then Check Range.

The only way to not allow models to target anything outside range would be to allow premeasuring.

[Ratty]

However under this rule, you would declare an attack on the Dreamer, Then check range, if a Nightmare was legal it would fizzle as he was not a legal target.

[Wodschow]

Hmm.. Doh. I see the problem.

But you should probably take note of which Nightmares are within 3" of him at all times. Whenever a Nightmare or the Dreamer have moved recheck whether there's less than 3" between them. That's how we've been doing it anyway, so we always know which Nightmares must be targeted before the Dreamer.

[Ratty]

However you would not have to target a Nightmare if you couldn't see it (No Line of Sight) I would also assume you would not have to target it if you were not in range of the Nightmare. However your range guess would have to be right on. I can guess 8" ranges within 1/10 of an inch most of the time these days so it's very possible. If you made a mistake and were in range of the Nightmare your attack just wouldn't go through as your target is not legal, in much the same way as if you targeted something out of range normally.