Hardest Masters to win with?

[ToTaly Wyrd]

@ Mad Arcanist Opheila has the highest damage out put i have ever seen/use plus she took like to games to get a grip of trust me she can be better than the ortegas cause guess what I've had Ophelia kill Perdtia mono y monoone turn. she rocks you just have to work out the combos with a few of the models

plus have to ask were did you get the info on her

[ducat]

Well having read what preceeds, I think I have to disagree with nearly all.

I use the Viks and Sonia as my primary masters, and find both equally good. Obviously some masters give them a harder time than others, but this is true of any master in the game.

I also have Levi, and he can prove difficult to beat, but I would say its a lot harder work to actually achieve a win with him. He requires a very high level of concentration I feel to get him working well

I also agree that Ramos feels like a master it could be hard to win with, he just appears very slow, but then I have only played against him, not with him.

To be honest, I think most of the masters can win, its more down to what strategys you and your opponant get and how your schemes pan out in conjunction with your crews choices. heh a cop out answer....

[Murphy'sLawyer]

To be honest, I think most of the masters can win, its more down to what strategys you and your opponant get and how your schemes pan out in conjunction with your crews choices. heh a cop out answer....

Not a cop out answer at all. Many players feel that a master is too weak when his crew hits a bad match up. Yes any master can be made to shine with the right crew to match a strategy. And I think this might be the truth of it. Few masters do well at every strategy which means the you have to be ready to switch up your crew to fit the strategy and your opponent's faction. I know people tend to dislike Rock, Paper, Scissors comparison but that is how this game works. Some casters are better against others.

Part of learning the game requires you to figure this out and overcome it so you can face challenging opponents.

[James.]

What about us poor Pandora players eh? No one sparing a thought for us?

Weirdly I found Ophelia to be more powerful than Pandora in a way, she just presses the win button (companion, all use reckless, companion with two slophaulers to heal the wounds caused up again etc.) and she unleashes hell!

I think it's really difficult to judge which are harder to win with, when I first saw colette on paper she looked a bit meh, but a friend plays her and he makes her crew really dangerous to play against, so just goes to show what I know

I'm actually going to pick my three based on ducats theory of Levi. See I think all masters can win fairly easily with the right schemes, but I think some masters need more brain power on the day to use, and if you have an off day or you just don't concentrate you'll probably lose. So my hardest to win with if you're not on good form would be:

Levi.

Colette.

Pandora (some people will cry at me over that one, but really if you don't watch what you're doing with her, you really can mess up, she's not a straight forward master. What all you non Pandora players don't realise is that it isn't how powerful Dora is, it's just that we all work on such a higher level than the rest of you that we make it look easy)

James.

p.s. My choices were the ones I believe, however, there may be one or two parts of this post that were just for fun, so don't get upset at me

[ProdigalPunk]

Wow, I personally think Colette and Pandora are top 3 masters easy. Colette might be harder to win with, but once you get good with her that difficulty goes way down.

I think Ramos has one thing going for him, and that is a little bit of synergy with the Duet. The Duet is easily the best model in the game in my opinion, and it would not be hard to get a guaranteed 4Vp on turn 1 (turn 2 at the latest) in a Ramos list.

[Sebo]

It changes from match up to match up.

My Gremlins do well against Zori, against Von Schill... luck is always against me. It's funny how people played them off as weak. Well, they make most Gremlin units useless, Bayou only do 1/1/2 damage (or does 1 damage become 0 due to armor?), Young'ins while tiny only require one hit from Von (his weakest), and outside of Rami and Bayou, Gremlin's range is 8 inches. Blast has no effect, and while yes Slop Haulers are excellent, 2 point action to heal (can they use reckless to move and then heal? can they heal themselves?) in close proximity which is great for specialists.

And yeah, their damage out is good with dumb and lucky, but with a leader with nimble and good range one his overpowered pistol (with critical hit to top it off), you lose health to deal more only to get finished off.

Of course it doesn't help that I lose nearly every duel, and my opponent pulled 10 rams for healing (out of 12) and heals 3 wounds 90% of time, where as I keep getting only one 1 to offset reckless (which was used to avoid getting killed in the open). This exact thing has been happening for 5 games now, and I'm always using cover, never failing because of being out of range (just failing to hit because of cards), etc.

Of course you can blame it on the cards, but then why the hell are there tournaments for a game dependent on dice rolls or cards and people claiming that they "got that opponent in the bag" as if it were a show of skill?

[Mr. Bigglesworth]

Hardest masters to win with in my experience:

2 of these masters are based mainly on their ability to survive. Most part when you master dies so does your chance at victory.

Vicks even with Von Schill they are still pretty single purposed. They are the 3rd best in melee as masters but they are so easy to kill with 8 wounds and lower def.

Lady J I would say 1st in melee... second being lilith. Her crew and Lady J are kind of slow for being so good in melee, this makes it hard to complete a lot of strategies. She is still one of my favorite to play.

Levi just doesn't impress me. He is pretty easy to take down, and a lot of his crew is insignificant.

Sonia is an amazing master in the right hands and with the guild it is not about master crew synergy like it is in the Neverborn it is more about the diversity of crews one master can lead into the fray, also it is about preparedness.

I think this thread would be best if people asked what is the weakest master in each faction?

[Rathnard]

I think this thread would be best if people asked what is the weakest master in each faction?

Well I did mention that option in my OP, but everyone prefered listing them overall.

For me, the hardest per faction would be;

Guild - Sonnia

Arcanist - Marcus

Ressers - Nicodem? Honestly I don't have a massive amount of experience vs Ressers so this is an informed guess more than anything.

Neverborn - Pandora. She's pretty much all about Wp duels so if an opponent can negate that or just focus on her crew, she'll have a tough time winning.

Outcasts - Viktorias.

[James.]

Neverborn - Pandora. She's pretty much all about Wp duels so if an opponent can negate that or just focus on her crew, she'll have a tough time winning.

Speak yee not of the Perdita/Gorvernors proxy hell!

I appreciate getting them to fall back will kill them out right in front of the Governors proxy, the problem is beating them in any WP duel where Dita is already wp8 (higher than Doras) and moves up to 10 in front of the proxy. Then there's all the bloody minions with Stubborn and another +2 from the proxy. The horror!

James.

[micahwc]

Neverborn - Pandora. She's pretty much all about Wp duels so if an opponent can negate that or just focus on her crew, she'll have a tough time winning.

This is why I take her with one or two sets of the twins. Lelu can hurt things badly by himself without the additional WP damage.

[hippieshopper]

Nico is not really underpowered...he just takes a little bit of finesse.

He's a beefier version of Ramos...with zombies.

[CannonFodder]

It really depends on the strategy you get. I play archanist and outcast mercs and it really depends on the goal you get.

Rasputina has a weakness when it comes to making it to your opponents deployment zone. But as an objective defender she is devastating.

Colette has the hardest learning curve in the game (opinion on what I saw), but excels in evasive tactics. My last game she 'died' twice' when my opponents goal was to basically kill her. but being able to pull a rabbit out her hat is what she does. Just make sure you always have a soulstone and keep a cheap showgirl hidden someplace.

Ramos I think is best suited in a position where he is the center of your universe and most of your faction needs to circle him to get his benefits. but has a weakness for a reliance on a single suit, when new totem comes out he will be much stronger.

Marcus (don't play)

Vonschills : solidly balanced, but does nothing that excels.

Victorias, has a great strength when it comes to moving objects around, I agree with the comment before that her mercs are good out put but get a little fragile on the defense. with the friekops models has a much better balance.

The masters that are labeled as over all strong are usually the best damage outputters and mobile (neverborn chompy & lilith) . If your opponent has no models left has least chance of accomplishing his goals. but if you can keep up them chasing a something you can mitigate that.

FYI: convicted gunslinger in a defensive posture is devastating. Had him over seeing an objective and a desolation get in range, and took him out in 1 activation (range flurry & 2 triggers of overpower). I think he can single handedly make up for that weakness.

[Ratty]

Vonschills : solidly balanced, but does nothing that excels.

You say that, but there were 2 von Schill based crews running last night. In the 3 games they played they won 2 games and the 3rd game there was only 1vp difference at the end.

Von Schill himself is a undead killer, he can easily take out a belle in a round of shooting, and can even take down Seamus fairly easily, to be honest I think he has stronger shooting than Seamus and is faster moving. The Librarian is amazing. 3 healing flips a turn where you need them as long as you have a ram in your hand.

Edited March 16, 2011 by Ratty

[Stargazer]

^ I'd echo that, I'd also argue that almost any master can win yes some are easier to do it with (pandora ahem.) However I do concede that every crew has its bad matchups but that is something that has to be played around rather than a massive issue in the rules.

Remember not everything is always black and white

[Necromorph]

Levi just doesn't impress me. He is pretty easy to take down, and a lot of his crew is insignificant.

Eeesh, never thought I'd see Levi make this list, lol.

He's not exactly hard to win with, he's just a bit more complex in his rules, and the diversity of his crew, thus takes more time to master his nuances. His starter crew is mainly insignificant, but he can field a remarkable amount of models from "all" factions which are not insig., thus giving him a tremendous amount of variety that can be tailored to any playstyle. However, knowing what models to take vs. certain masters takes some tough learning, and can make him seem underwhelming if he's used incorrectly with poor crew selection.

As for killing him easily, it's not really that easy. The only crews I've seen take him down easily are Perdita and Sonia (austringers+family nuke, and Advaced Counterspell can be ugly)...and maybe the dreamer due to his ability to get behind levi and kill his waifs, but yeah. Being able to get close, deal with Levi's damage output, and take care of him and 2 waifs in a turn isn't quite as easy as it sounds every game.

If played by a very skilled person (not that I am, but I've seen it done) Levi can be nigh unstoppable vs. a lot of crews.

On topic, from what I've witnessed, the 3 crews I'd say are:

Lady J

Viks

Marcus

(Ramos doesn't seem all that awesome, but I've never seen him played so can't speculate).

[CannonFodder]

You say that, but there were 2 von Schill based crews running last night. In the 3 games they played they won 2 games and the 3rd game there was only 1vp difference at the end.

Von Schill himself is a undead killer, he can easily take out a belle in a round of shooting, and can even take down Seamus fairly easily, to be honest I think he has stronger shooting than Seamus and is faster moving. The Librarian is amazing. 3 healing flips a turn where you need them as long as you have a ram in your hand.

I'm the only one to play with von schills in my LGS, only tried him 2-3 times so far. Found he is solid, but not a match when going against Lilith or chompy my only 2 opponents.

[Amarel]

Von Schill himself is a undead killer, he can easily take out a belle in a round of shooting, and can even take down Seamus fairly easily, to be honest I think he has stronger shooting than Seamus and is faster moving. The Librarian is amazing. 3 healing flips a turn where you need them as long as you have a ram in your hand.

He certainly has a good chance to take down a Belle in a round of shooting, but he still needs semi-decent cards to get the damage to cheatable, and then may need to cheat. Certainly he has a better chance than a lot of other models, though.

I'm not seeing him taking down Seamus fairly easily, though - and I've tried. All of Von Schill's anti-Undead is no use against Seamus so you're looking at a lot of negative flips. I do agree that he's a little faster moving, and also that his shooting his better (longer range and can fire twice making up for the higher damage on Seamus' gun), but then he doesn't have any spells so that ought to be the case .

[Ratty]

How does he need decent cards to get it to cheatable. He removes Hard to Wound from Undead and gets a on damage. So all he needs to do is get a hit and he's on a flat damage flip.

Against Seamus, he will probably be getting weak damage but with a :rams that is 4Dg a time on Seamus.. All he needs to do is jump into position, take 2 shots and then win initiative next turn to get another 3 shots and Seamus is toast. Even if he survives he probably will be out of soulstones.

Edited March 18, 2011 by Ratty

[FrereSebastian]

Collette might have a really high learning curve to play but in all honesty, I think the master with the highest learning curve is most definitely Somer teeth.

[Genetic]

I know im going to get grief for this but marcus... Sure he has some movement shenanigans but other than that, i dont see much out of him

[Ratty]

I know im going to get grief for this but marcus... Sure he has some movement shenanigans but other than that, i dont see much out of him

Don't think your going to get any argument with that actually. It's a shame, because with that bare chest he's dreamy.

[Absolution Black]

Don't think your going to get any argument with that actually. It's a shame, because with that bare chest he's dreamy.

Take a cold shower ratty!!

[Amarel]

How does he need decent cards to get it to cheatable. He removes Hard to Wound from Undead and gets a on damage. So all he needs to do is get a hit and he's on a flat damage flip.

Misquoting me doesn't magically make my point wrong, but well done for doing so. I said (and I quote) "semi-decent cards". As my opponent is trying to prevent me from hitting his Belle (not sure how it works where you play), I can be reasonably certain that I will need semi-decent cards to beat him by at least one twice in a row (you are wrong in saying all you need to do is hit, because if you only equal his score you'll still be on a -neg flip), and bear in mind that as you need moderate damage twice (or at least one severe) you'll need to keep cards back to ensure that you do that on the damage flip (unless you get lucky with Crit Strike).

Against Seamus, he will probably be getting weak damage but with a :rams that is 4Dg a time on Seamus.. All he needs to do is jump into position, take 2 shots and then win initiative next turn to get another 3 shots and Seamus is toast. Even if he survives he probably will be out of soulstones.

O_o "all he needs to do is"...

So jump into position (thanks opponent for leaving Seamus there), take 2 shots (and just happen to win both duels with Rams), win initiative (easy as that) and then take another 3 shots.

Right... Probably best to wait until my opponent leaves the room until I try for a guarantee on this one, eh?

And if Seamus does survive and just happens to be out of Soulstones, Von Schill is still stood in front of him looking like a lemon and waiting for retribution.

Yes, it could all happen, but I really wouldn't rely on it and I still stick to my initial point of "I'm not seeing him taking down Seamus fairly easily, though - and I've tried."

[Wodschow]

Eh, yeah.. Even Von Schill shouldn't have that easy a time with Seamus.. O_o

And two shots at most during a single activation..

Edit:

I think other Masters are better suited for taking out Seamus..

[Amarel]

Eh, yeah.. Even Von Schill shouldn't have that easy a time with Seamus.. O_o

And two shots at most during a single activation..

Exactly.

I think other Masters are better suited for taking out Seamus..

Definitely. Von Schill can neuter him quite effectively by mopping up the rotting flotsam and jetsam and then removing the corpse counters, but in terms of actually taking him out that's best left to whichever heavy hitter you brought along for the ride (e.g. Misaki).