The Best "Ride" for C. Hoffman: Steamborg vs. Peacekeeper

[izikial]

im a fan of the minner, i know it locks you out of ryle, and i do lament this, but a tunnaling hoff is amazing and really hard to kill, you second turn steal the miners mm and the hoff will kill most things that get in his way. i also use the mobial toolkit, and that can just spring to hoff when ever

[Iron Skies]

In response to a point made earlier with the steamborg and soft cover. Hoffman would cancel that out if he was in base contact with the steamborg.

This is due to Dampening : No blasts, pulses or aura's can be placed or originate within 3" of Hoffman unless it is the Hoff's activation, so the steamborg would not get to use the cloud cover (Though the hoff still could, though that would defeat an ability of the steamborgs as the hoff would need to use a 0 and a 1 action to make the cloud)

[Genetic]

I'm a fan of the steamborg.. decapitation is a awesome trigger, and I've had alot of fun using knock-aside

[Satyrwyld]

The rule says only may be taken by crews containing Arcanist masters, it's NOT only arcanist crews. So a guild crew with Hoff taking Ramos as a partner can take them.

Cophyree are constructs, and Hoff has no such rule. He has a rule that allows him to hire Arcanist constructs in addition to Guild models as long as those constructs don't have smouldering or icy hearts. Cophyree are constructs and have neither so he can hire them, as long as their special rule is dealt with by having Ramos or Collette as a brawl Partner

This is wrong too... Ramos has no such ability to hire constructs from other factions.. Some construct in the Guild list have a rule that means that Arcanists can use them.

Bah, s'what I get for posting from memory, (1) thought it said "led by Arcanit Masters," and (3) been playing too much Leve recently, it seems he's bleeding over. My apologies. Though in my defense, my 2nd point should have clarified "Arcanist" constructs, which is what allows him to brawl with Ramos. My point was that he cannot Brawl with Colette, or any other Arcanist Master (or Kaeris)

[Ratty]

Bah, s'what I get for posting from memory, (1) thought it said "led by Arcanit Masters," and (3) been playing too much Leve recently, it seems he's bleeding over. My apologies. Though in my defense, my 2nd point should have clarified "Arcanist" constructs, which is what allows him to brawl with Ramos. My point was that he cannot Brawl with Colette, or any other Arcanist Master (or Kaeris)

He can Brawl with Collette. But you have to take Arcanists and then take Hoffman as your 2nd Master. Collette can hire him as he is a M&SU member.

Edited April 11, 2011 by Ratty

[Adran]

To Clarify

Brawls containing Hoffman

Hoffman and Ramos - Guild crew

Hoffman and Colete - Arcanist crew.

[Ratty]

To Clarify

Brawls containing Hoffman

Hoffman and Ramos - Guild crew

Hoffman and Colete - Arcanist crew.

Yep..

and Hoffman and Levi - can be either Outcast or Guild, but it doesn't really matter as Levi crew selection criteria override almost everything.

[Satyrwyld]

He can Brawl with Collette. But you have to take Arcanists and then take Hoffman as your 2nd Master. Collette can hire him as he is a M&SU member.

...right, excuse me, I'm going to go hide under a rock until this term is over. Clearly being forced to read Jane Eyre and Shakespeare is forcing out all of the useful and fun knowledge I've been storing up...

[Jonas Albrecht]

I dunno, Jane Eyre and Malifaux have a lot of overlap.

[Necromorph]

Peacekeeper primarily because Hoffman can negate it's "short out" type abilities and it's cost.

[Adran]

Having tried Hoffman yesterday, I'm going to add in the guardian.

He is slow, but the shield is amazing with Machine puppet. Cheating in low rams to garentee me 3 damage a hit when I missed! And you can get 4 machine puppets off in one activation slot, followed by the guardian making its own attack.

[FearLord]

Having tried Hoffman yesterday, I'm going to add in the guardian.

He is slow, but the shield is amazing with Machine puppet. Cheating in low rams to garentee me 3 damage a hit when I missed! And you can get 4 machine puppets off in one activation slot, followed by the guardian making its own attack.

Wow does that work? That's amazing! How are you getting 4 Machine Puppet's though? I can only see 3?

[Adran]

Give the guardian slow to give you fast. Machine puppet.

Reactivate Hoffman using override edict.

After you have finished Hoffmans activation, he re activates. give him fast (again giving the guardian slow). 3 more machine puppets.

You can then link in the Guardian if you want for a 5th attack.

Edit

Hold on, just realised I can't overide edict himself, as it has a resist stat so counts as an attack. Never mind. Pox will never notice...

Edited April 13, 2011 by Adran

[tadaka]

You cant not cast a spell with a resist check on yourself per the rules manual.That means no giving hoffman reactivate.

Not sure crit strike works with shield effect. Not 100% sure that it does not work however.

Edited April 13, 2011 by tadaka

[Adran]

Ninja'd on my own post.

[Wodschow]

For whatever it's worth.. I think the shield trick works, but it was discussed before and the concensus between forumites seemed to be that it wouldn't work..

Don't recall there being a ruling on the matter though.

Edit:

Still I think it's worth having another minion as the ride and to let the Guardian tag along with his Overprotective.. At least for the first few turns, yields you alot more movement that way..

[MadArcanist]

in terms of the RM (which I was just checking before I posted) it states that during the combat you can activate triggers before applying final results... and all Crit strike does is give a +1 damage for each :rams in the combat total. Which means that since shield hits regardless it would still get the extra damage (at least from a RaW standing)

[LoboStele]

Yeah, we noticed the Shield/Machine Puppet thing last week as well. I don't know that I would use the Guardian for Hoffman's ride though. It's much slower, and will snap into base contact with Hoffman et al at the end of the turn anyways most of the time.

[i_was_like_you]

Here's a question on Hoffman's Maintain Machines and Steamborg Exectioner's Complex Machine:

Hoffman

Maintain Machines: Other friendly Constructs within 6" may choose to ignore any of their listed Abilities.

Steamborg Executioner

Complex Machine: This model counts as a living model and may only be healed by Ramos. When killed, it generates 2 Scrap Counters and 1 Corpse Counter.

If the Steamborg is within 6" of the Hoff and chooses to ignore Complex Machine, he has to ignore the entire ability, correct?

So that means if he ignores it, he:

1) Doesn't count as a living model.

2) May be healed by other models, most likely Hoffman.

And here's where my question really comes in,

3) Does not generate 2 Scrap Counters and 1 Corpse Counter.

For his base size, would he default to generating 3 Scrap Counters, as he is a 50mm Construct? Is this how people have been running it, or is there some other variable?

[nilus]

3) Does not generate 2 Scrap Counters and 1 Corpse Counter.

For his base size, would he default to generating 3 Scrap Counters, as he is a 50mm Construct? Is this how people have been running it, or is there some other variable?

Thats how I would run it. He generates 3 scrap for Hoff. Which is nice but if you are looking for a cheap scrap counter generator you can find a lot better canidates.

[Ratty]

If you used Hoffman's 'Maintain Machin' ability you would have to ignore all the text of an ability you can't pick or choose. So you could heal it but it would also go back to dropping 3 Scrap counters as is standard for it's base size.

[i_was_like_you]

That's what I thought. Thanks.

It seems at least three of us from my group all want to play Hoffman, but not necessarily as a primary master. I guess, technically, he'd end up being the primary if I used him with Ramos, but that's not quite the same as one of our guys running a whole Guild Hoffman and Lucius Crew or our other guy adding Hoffman to his Colette Crew.

Cheap scrap counters would be Ramos's Salvage under fire leading into waves of spiders. Ended the game with 13 Scrap counters sitting there, mostly due to my own crew, but a dead Teddy and dead Hooded Rider added their share, as well.

Edited April 15, 2011 by i_was_like_you

[FearLord]

If you used Hoffman's 'Maintain Machin' ability you would have to ignore all the text of an ability you can't pick or choose. So you could heal it but it would also go back to dropping 3 Scrap counters as is standard for it's base size.

In practice though, surely you could pick and choose whether to apply 'Maintain Machines' every time an ability like 'Complex Machine' came up, since it's passive?

I would say every time something would interact with Complex machine, while a Steamborg was within the range of Maintain Machines, it could choose to ignore the interaction.

For example, if targeted by an effect that only effected living models, it could choose to ignore Complex machine, and therefore wouldn't be a viable target for the effect. If it is killed later in the turn, it could choose separately whether or not to ignore Complex machine for the purposes of putting down scrap counters - you could effectively choose whether to put down 3 scrap counters or 2 and a corpse counter...

Another example would be Hoffman and his increased CA from constructs - you'd need the Mechanical assistant to provide the 'Maintain Machines' (because it only applies to other constructs), but this should allow him to ignore the increased CA if he were targeted by Sonnia (thus keeping his CA below her threshold) but not ignore it when he was actually casting spells...

[Aldyhide]

Peacekeeper all the way. My friend plays hoffman and loves that thing. I'm glad I got it for him. Despite the fact that it keeps chasing me down.