Hamelin is better than we think

[Drake]

Yes, Creepy Structure! I played Magic at the weekend, managed to kill Hamelin and get him down to a couple of stones, at which point he came back (fair enough) but proceeded to gain another 10 odd stones through multiple rat interactions for bonus soulstones. Absolutely crazy to watch!

As for the suggestion Magic made about COnstructs and Gremlins being immune to Bully, might that push the balance the other way against crews made up solely of those types of models, e.g. Ophelia and Ramos. Maybe an alternative option is to make Bully a Wp-Wp duel where against Constructs and Gremlins Hamelin makes the duel at -xWp. Keeps in fluff, makes those crews playable against Hamelin while not being totally immune therefore still ensures Bully has an effect in the game.

Just a thought and suggestion...

[Sandwich]

Sandwich here.

I haven't been on in a couple of months and haven't played Malifaux for longer than that.

I just hopped on for a bit while eating waffles to see what's up.

Not that these stats are in anyway verifiable,

WinLossDraw

As Seamus

14+W - 1L - 4d

I stopped playing Seamus forever ago because I'm unbeatable and it isn't fun for anyone.

As Hamelin

11 W - 4L - 6d

I stopped playing Hamelin because I'm unbeatable and it isn't fun for anyone.

Feel free to discredit me as you please, however.

- - -

No.

Hamelin is not broken, he's not OP, he's not even near broken.

He's cheesy, that's for sure, and he's very unforgiving to mistakes made against him.

But so is Zoraida, so is Seamus, so is Perdita.

Are any of them OP and broken? I think not.

And yes, I'm the real Sandwich.

And yes, I remember my argument(s).

And yes I know you're going to disagree with me regardless of what is said.

The problem everyone has is that they play versus him in a horrible fashion when all it takes is some common sense.

Lets put theoryfauxing aside and get down to the raw truth.

1.) Hamelin Himself

Hamelin is a Df 5, Wd 12, hard as f*ck to kill murdermachine and spell flinging titan. How much do you wanna bet that your Guild Executioner is going to get the ban hammer if he comes anywhere near me?

Yeah, I though so. So why on Earth would you EVER try to kill Hamelin? Just let him do his thing and pray that by the time his slow ass gets to you (Any Hamelin worth his Salt will be moving 5" max per turn, if you can force him to move 10" then you're doing great), your Objectives are done.

The #1 COUNTER TO HAMELIN is LoS.

Yeah, he's got a Ca of 7 and a Range of 12" on his (1)Understand the Soulless but he sure as f*ck can't see through walls.

The bane of my Hamelin is walls. If I can't see you, I can't destroy you early game. And if I can't destroy you early game, then boom, you should be set to do something worthwhile.

Think about it like this, if by the fourth turn I've been forced to move Hamelin non-stop just to hit you with (1)Understand the Soulless, I've been working counter productive by now. After the second turn if I can see you're just going to play keep away, then its time to ignore you and hit my objectives. That's when you line up the strike on Nix.

Please don't be stupid and make it obvious either, anyone will see you perching your snipers on those building surrounding Nix.

2.) Nix, the bull Terrier

For some reason, dropping Nix is huge super srs business to people, but I don't know why.

If you sic your big bad meany pants models on Nix, fine, I'll sack him to make you Insignificant, I don't care, and I won't care when you rage about your stupid failure.

Nix is not a beacon for Nihilism, Nix is stupid easy to kill, shoot him with practically anything and your opponent is gonna stick him behind cover for good.

Don't sic any melee crap on Nix, that's stupid. He's at 5 Df and could possibly put you at a for the duel. If you fail, he heals, if he heals, you fail. Plain and simple.

Don't waste huge resources on bringing Nix down.

And please for the love of Katy Perry never take Grudge or Kill Protege on Nix.

People seem to think Nix is a suparr omg important asset to Hamelin but he's really not if your play Hamelin like a competant person, but chances are, they don't, if you take Kill Protege, I will sack Nix right off the bat and make your life miserable in other ways.

Since people keep screaming "OMG OP OP OP OP OP cuddle PLZ GOSTCRAWLIR"

Your best bet with handling Nix is some fine and dandy CC if its available to you.

If it isn't, just roll a mediocre caster or shooter model (Even a crappy one will work, Nix is pretty squishy when you know how to murder him, the Convict Gunslinger comes to mind) and just puppyguard areas you know they want Nix to be.

If they keep Nix near Hamelin for their (1)Understand the Soulless, (1)Irresistible Lure, (0)Emptiness combo, cool, you won't even need to deal with it and they're wasting activations doing jack diddly hooha.

3.) The Rat Swarm

The Rat Swarm is the overall source of much QQ towards me because I use it flawlessly and without stupidity. It's nigh impossible to get away from this stupid thing and if anything gets a cuddle, it needs to be Rats. Although honestly its not OP, its just incredibly powerful. (Just like a swarm of Rotten Belles, or Lady J + Lucius, or anything of the like, and chances are, I'm spending 9 SS on Rats and 5 SS on a Rat Catcher, so they'd best act like a 14 point model.)

The Rat swarm is only going to die if you bring Ranged models and murder the Rat Catcher. Once again, the Convict Gunslinger is perfect, especially if you've got a hand full of Rams.

If you do use the CG and murder their stupid Rat Catcher, cast (1)Supressing Fire on the Rats and its good game.

If you don't do what I say, stick with something that doesn't need to be in the swarm to deal with it, or just run.

There's honestly no counter to a well played swarm, much like there's no counter to a well played Coryphee, or a well played Nekima, or even a well played Marcus Alpha strike.

4.) The Stolen

Use your second to last AP to kill a stolen. With the current rendition of the ruling on Paralyze (Unless they've changed it in the last 2 months of my not paying attention) You'll receive Paralyze until the end of your turn, and heyo, its the end of your turn.

The Stolen are incredibly powerful and are only ignorable if you allow Hamelin to build them in large number.

Most Hamelin players will start with only 1-3 because they know they can just make more and more.

If you play Guild a lot, a model that comes to mind for me is those Watcher bird things.

They're fast, can't be locked down, ignore LoS and can easily peg Stolen nonstop, so if you play Guild, take one, or two, or three, or whatever.

Another perfect guild model that is a 100% must have is the Witchling Stalker. (Which is literally a hard-counter to Hamelin the Plagued)

Dispel, AoE, ranged, et cetera.

For other factions I'm not sure, I know there's quite a few models in the 4-7 range for most factions that are incredibly solid and screwing over Hamelin.

5.) Hamelin's Tactics

Hamelin's crew is a three trick pony, all of which are overpowered and overwhelming if you like to mash your face on the keyboard while playing solitaire and then expect to win.

Otherwise, he's pathetically easy to decimate and will leave you with a sense of fashion and self gratification.

To beat Hamelin, figure out which of these three tactics he's using and scroll down to its specific section.

REALIZE THAT THESE THREE TRICKS CAN BE CHANGED AT ANY POINT DURING A GAME.

BEATING HAMELIN = NOT BEING A ONE TRICK PONY YOURSELF.

PART ONE: RAT SWARM

(Realize a well executed Rat Swarm is uncounterable and will rely entirely on you flipping high cards all day long, or at least that's my experience.)

This is a section not many players fall into, because it requires certain finesse to maintain successfully throughout a 4-6 turn game. A Rat Swarm playstyle is difficult to recognize before the third turn as they could easily start with any number of different models to throw you off, so play it safe until you know for sure what they'll be doing. For any of these three strategies, you basically need a list with

At least 1 Ranged (Please just use the f*cking Convict Gunslinger),

At least one AoE if possible

At least one Terrifying ->12+ (Or even a model that can use Morale Duels)

If you're Guild, you 100% must bring a Witchling Stalker, or else you really don't want to screw Hamelin over nonstop.

---

The basic concept of a Rat Swarm is to

1. Expunge endless Resource via The Void

2. Outnumber the foe via Rats

3. Overwhelm the opposition via (0)Impetuous

When facing 12-2,500 Malifaux Rats, you may feel completely and utterly boned, but that's not always the case.

Using your Ranged (Convict Gunslinger, please) focus down their Rat Catcher, and don't say "Omg impossible u r not rite."

For the Convict Gunslinger, if you know you have high Rams in your hand, just use a (1) action Strike (Triggering Trigger Happy) to kill the Rat Catcher and then (1)Suppressing Fire on the rats, this will completely stem the tide and will cause hilarious Rage. If this is executed correctly there is no real return to a swarm and your opponent MUST change strategies.

You absolutely must use hit and run tactics, its possible that if a single model gets hit by the swarm, its pretty much game over.

With the Rat Catcher(s) down, your opponent will be forced to sack three rats (Effectively 2) to get a new Rat Catcher, or bring Hamelin in to beacon the swarm until he can afford the numbers to bring back a Rat Catcher.

If you can manage to kill off any rats, good.

If not, its time to high tail it or fail and die, spread the swarm as thin as you can.

Dedicate at least one model to completing objectives, but don't be an idiot and try to sneak past Hamelin and his crew to do so.

I can't say much else with Theoryfaux, each swarm will act differently, and everyone of you has a different playstyle for each individual crew.

PART TWO: STOLEN / NIX

This combo will rely on Nix to spread Blight Counters and (0)Emptiness while hundreds of thousands of The Stolen cast (1)Bleeding Disease. Players using this strategy will often try to get Hamelin to spread Insignificant and then pull models in with (1)Irresistible Lure so that Hamelin can lock them down and keep Nix nearby. This is easily avoiding by blocking Hamelin from your LoS, forcing both Nix and The Stolen to move into place to kill your models. Don't be afraid to kill The Stolen, or even to actively hunt them down to keep Hamelin on edge all game. If you find an opportunity to smack Hamelin around with relative safety, feel free to do so, it'll force him to ice a model to replenish his health.

If he does manage to plant Nix in the middle of a group of your models, you really deserve to lose because you were stupid and grouped up.

But seeing as I'm helping as best as I can, your best bet is going to be waiting until you can grab initiation and just plow into Nix as hard as you can. Dropping Nix will likely end with them switching strategies and pulling a Rat Swarm or Hamelin the Banhammer tactic so be ready to get outta dodge as fast as your tiny tin legs will carry you.

PART THREE: HAMELIN the BANHAMMER

Only stupid players will begin with this tactic. The more intelligent players will wait until your entire crew is Insignificant and at that point you've lost the game anyway so I can't help you at all.

If they do open with this tactic, you'll know immediately, they'll stick 3 or four stolen in their Deployment zone and run headlong at something to hit.

The basic idea behind the Banhammer is using (0)Fate is Meaningless with the Black Staff to hit you as hard as possible, some players will follow up with Hamelin's (1)Bleeding Disease (and Plague) to mop up that model.

Chances are, they'll have two or three Stolen hanging around to do some extra damage with (1)Bleeding Disease.

In a game versus The Banhammer, you'll want to waste Hamelin, and then Nix.

And don't act like Nix is super hard to kill, if you bring a ranged or Caster, its good game Nix.

Hamelin will come back of course, obviously this player is going to have 50,000 Stolen all over the place, but he's going to be in a bad way, because he's going to need to run back to where ever he was.

Try to kill as many stolen as you can to keep him summoning them back so that he isn't plowing through you with 3 AP full of brutality, and stay mobile.

Edited June 14, 2011 by Sandwich

[Sandwich]

Also Ratty, might I suggest reducing the Rat's Wk to 3 or 4?

I think it'll work well to stop the super fast juggernaut swarm.

Because right now with the rule on placement (Unless its changed in 2 months), the Rats get about a free 1" each time they come back, so their Wk is effectivel 6" (11" total with Writhing Mass) and I really don't think that's very fair for a 2 point model.

Although I'm sure the Rat Swarm was isolated within my gaming group and may not effect other groups that don't use the swarm as I did.

[Ratty]

Yeah I've always said that the rats should be placed in the center of the model they are replacing due to death. This would also speed up the game as every rat wouldn't have to do the btb shuffle every time you AOE kill them.

[Sandwich]

Yeah I've always said that the rats should be placed in the center of the model they are replacing due to death. This would also speed up the game as every rat wouldn't have to do the btb shuffle every time you AOE kill them.

Or actually that's a way better idea.

Like, way better.

It'd fix the boring aspect of Hamelin's gameplay, would remove an aspect of micromanaging, and would slow the Swarm decently.

I fully support it.

Brilliant.

[ZiggyQubert]

Yeah I've always said that the rats should be placed in the center of the model they are replacing due to death. This would also speed up the game as every rat wouldn't have to do the btb shuffle every time you AOE kill them.

I would also second that, anything that speeds up the play is great, the fact that it also tones down the rats a bit is also good

[Cats Laughing]

Sandwich here.

As Hamelin

11 W - 4L - 6d

I stopped playing Hamelin because I'm unbeatable and it isn't fun for anyone.

Feel free to discredit me as you please, however.

Amazingly arrogant post for only 21 games played with Hamelin, and only a ~good~ but far from perfect win-loss-draw record. You can't have even played against every master/henchman with Hamelin in only 21 games, given the 20 masters and 6 henchmen in the game currently.

(you did say to go ahead and try to discredit you

Otherwise thanks for the post. Could use some reformatting/rewording to make a decent tactica. I'll certainly keep your thoughts in mind when facing the local Hamelin player (or when picking up Hamelin myself).

[Math Mathonwy]

Yeah...kinda with Magic on dropping out of the debate...now it's come down to Grammar Trolling/Nerd Raging, so there's no need to continue. The only other thing I'll say is that when talking about fixing something in a game, balance has to be considered, so it does have a place in the discussion, but maybe not to such an extreme level.

So when the discussion gets back to Hamelin himself I'll continue. Unless some asshat want's to point out how I spelled something wrong or used something out of context to try and make their own argument look better.

Wow, way to escalate into personal attacks. Not cool man, not cool.

As for the suggestion Magic made about COnstructs and Gremlins being immune to Bully, might that push the balance the other way against crews made up solely of those types of models, e.g. Ophelia and Ramos.

Would someone be willing to test with immune-to-bully gremlins against Hamelin? I doubt that the balance would shift too drastically, but this is just theorying. Personally I really like the sound of that solution to the particular problem (of it being nearly impossible for Gremlins to win against a well-played Hamelin).

A problem with anti-Hamelin tactics is that they all seem to rely a lot on specific crew choices (like Convict Gunslinger or Perdita in Sandwich's long and somewhat self-contradictory post with, nonetheless, probably a lot of merits), which is something of a problem. Since you don't know whether you will be facing Hamelin or Vickys or Ophelia, choosing a very specific anti-Hamelin crew will spell trouble against, say, Ophelia. Now, some disparities are natural and all right, but right now I'd say that the balance is too skewed and you need a very specific anti-Hamelin crew to have an even chance of winning (other than slaughter but no one will choose to play Hamelin in a slaughter).

[Omenbringer]

How would you fix this? Sacrifice a friendly model and a casting flip?

Sacing a model might be good, but at the very least a high Casting Flip like every other summoning spell in the game.

1. I think getting a Stolen for free was very important when they had to be within 3" of Hamelin. I think keeping them free after the change has an unforeseen consequence now he only needs one anywhere on the board to survive. A casting flip as set out by ZiggyQubert would be a good fix, especially with his thoughts that it gets harder after he dies. There should be no requirement to sac a model or ss though.

I agree with you about the post errata problem and not requiring a SS to bring out (I do agree with Ratty's recommendation of Sacing a model though). Additionally, I believe I recommended the Casting flip for the Stolen first :poke:.

2. I really don't think Bully should prevent Gremlins or Construct from attacking him as per his hiring rules. This is fiar for Gremlin players.

3. I think Bully would benefit from a WP->14 or WP->WP dual to target Hamelin. However I realise this might not balance against him not getting any soulstones in his cache.

This is exactly why I recommended a WP resist instead of a blanket doesn't apply to constructs or gremlins. A WP resist would stay fluffy, offer him a bit of protection (also could provide a tactical decision as cheating it will provide Hamelin with a Control Card).

I think the above changes would be sufficient to balance out Hamelin without "Cuddling" him. How would you feel about playing against Hamelin with the above rules amended?

Given that a lot of these suggestions are very similar to the ones I made earlier I think it would balance him out enough.

Also, I hope no-one at Wyrd takes offence at these kind of threads. Essentially all we're doing is giving you feedback after months of playtesting - we're not "demanding" changes or the like. I know it's a pain in the ass to deal with stuff like this and there's a risk that if you make changes the floodgates about other stuff will open - but that's a call only you guys can make and I think we all understand that.

As I said earlier I think you would be surprised at how receptive the Wyrd crew is to these kinds of "constructive" arguments (as long as they dont devolve into flame wars). I would bet Nathan, Eric, Weird and the others are lurking in the shadows, discussing this in the secret developers section of the forum. As far as playtesting goes, no amount of that will discover everything (this is why erratas and re-balancing are important once the masses have gotten their hands on the model rules).

As for the suggestion Magic made about COnstructs and Gremlins being immune to Bully, might that push the balance the other way against crews made up solely of those types of models, e.g. Ophelia and Ramos. Maybe an alternative option is to make Bully a Wp-Wp duel where against Constructs and Gremlins Hamelin makes the duel at -xWp. Keeps in fluff, makes those crews playable against Hamelin while not being totally immune therefore still ensures Bully has an effect in the game.

Just a thought and suggestion...

As above I agree that allowing gremlins to target him without a simple WP duel might be a bit much. As for constructs, fluff-wise I have never really thought they should be affected by a lot of the WP resist type abilities in the game (Irrestible, Terrifying, etc.)

[magicpockets]

I stopped playing Hamelin because I'm unbeatable and it isn't fun for anyone.

Hamelin is not broken, he's not OP, he's not even near broken.

Also, be careful about bragging when you only play in your local meta-game. I recently flew to Orlando to play one of the clubs there and had a game against their best player with his "unbeaten tournament list" - by the end of turn one his entire crew was dead bar his master (LCB) who died a couple of turns later after I'd got my objectives. In his metagame he was a God, outside of it not so much.

Yeah I've always said that the rats should be placed in the center of the model they are replacing due to death. This would also speed up the game as every rat wouldn't have to do the btb shuffle every time you AOE kill them.

I disagree because of one often overlooked fact - if there isn't enough room to place a summoned model you can't summon a model. My opponents (*cough* Drake *cough*) have started to use attacking placement against the swarm to kill stuff and make it impossible to get another model back - change this mechanic and you lose that very effective approach at swarm management.

Sacing a model might be good, but at the very least a high Casting Flip like every other summoning spell in the game.

I agree with you about the post errata problem and not requiring a SS to bring out (I do agree with Ratty's recommendation of Sacing a model though). Additionally, I believe I recommended the Casting flip for the Stolen first :poke:

I disagree with having to sac a model, not only does it not make sense fluff-wise (which I think is important) it would have the effect of limiting how easy the spall can be cast (if that's what we're changing it to) placement-wise. With his card mechanic and how much he needs cards (and also him dropping to Ca3 when he comes back) I think it's enough to make it a cast to get it to work.

As I said earlier I think you would be surprised at how receptive the Wyrd crew is to these kinds of "constructive" arguments (as long as they dont devolve into flame wars). I would bet Nathan, Eric, Weird and the others are lurking in the shadows, discussing this in the secret developers section of the forum. As far as playtesting goes, no amount of that will discover everything (this is why erratas and re-balancing are important once the masses have gotten their hands on the model rules).

I totally understand that, I'm just conscious of how it could come across.

[Ratty]

I disagree because of one often overlooked fact - if there isn't enough room to place a summoned model you can't summon a model. My opponents (*cough* Drake *cough*) have started to use attacking placement against the swarm to kill stuff and make it impossible to get another model back - change this mechanic and you lose that very effective approach at swarm management.

I think this is more of a artefact of the rule than a tactic. IE because the rule works in a slightly weird way you can counter it in a slightly weird way. Changing it would remove this counter but would also slightly slow down the swarm, overall it would probably even out a bit, but more importantly it would speed up Hamelin's playstyle. Instead of every rat moving, shuffling 1 base, moving, shuffling 1 base, moving. You would lower it to moving, moving, moving. This should speed up the time it take for players to take a turn considerably. The other thing is if the Hamelin player is laying out his rats to stop the enemy from blocking him and the enemy is spending time trying to position models to get the most rats blocked this is going to slow things down even more over just the shuffle.

When dealing with Hamelin I don't think he's overly broken/overpowered, I do think there are 2 things that need to be fixed with him. The speed of gameplay, the game is designed to be played over 6 turns, if the average player can only get to turn 4 against him in a tournament, that gives him a huge advantage in certain strategies. The other is the fact he's a Hard Counter to certain crews, seeing as in tournaments you either choose your Master at the start or have to choose blind this means you can end up choosing a crew that has little to no way of dealing with him. Changing Bully to a Wp->Wp duel might help this a bit.

Edited June 15, 2011 by Ratty

[magicpockets]

The speed of gameplay, the game is designed to be played over 6 turns, if the average player can only get to turn 4 against him in a tournament, that gives him a huge advantage in certain strategies.

In almost every tournament I've played I think getting to turn 4 (ish) is average no matter the master. I can play Hamelin now as quick as any other master (that's in part why I'm confused why placing rats is taking so long for others) and in the last tournament I went to was waiting on the other player in every game I played. I think it comes down to knowing the rules/strategy more than placing summoned models.

The other is the fact he's a Hard Counter to certain crews, seeing as in tournaments you either choose your Master at the start or have to choose blind this means you can end up choosing a crew that has little to no way of dealing with him. Changing Bully to a Wp->Wp duel might help this a bit.

I agree this needs fixing for Gremlins as a metter of urgency and you know I'm a fan of weakening his bully rule in general.

However Hamelin is not as much of a tourny issue as you'd think - if I'm playing Hamelin my list to pick from (i.e. the 55ss pool of models) isn't going to have enough non-Hamlein minions in it to make fielding a Vik/Gremlin/VonSchill list possible. In short, if I'm playing Hamelin I'm going to be playing Hamelin every game - contrast that to say Neverborn.

[Drake]

However Hamelin is not as much of a tourny issue as you'd think - if I'm playing Hamelin my list to pick from (i.e. the 55ss pool of models) isn't going to have enough non-Hamlein minions in it to make fielding a Vik/Gremlin/VonSchill list possible. In short, if I'm playing Hamelin I'm going to be playing Hamelin every game - contrast that to say Neverborn.

That is fine in a 55SS list tournament where you can swap and change masters, but in a fixed Master tournament for example (such as the one next weekend in Cardiff), that wouldnt necessarily balance as well as once masters are chosen they are fixed. yes you can choose any minion, but you are still limited or at least hampered by the play style and natural synergies the master has and therefore the minions they generally want with them.

[magicpockets]

That is fine in a 55SS list tournament where you can swap and change masters, but in a fixed Master tournament for example (such as the one next weekend in Cardiff), that wouldnt necessarily balance as well as once masters are chosen they are fixed. yes you can choose any minion, but you are still limited or at least hampered by the play style and natural synergies the master has and therefore the minions they generally want with them.

Ash I don't get what your point is - the first post was about how hard it is to prep against "Outcast" because you don't know which master it will be and they play very, very differently. In a fixed master list if your opponent has Hamelin you know exactly what he'll be taking and his is one of the most restrictive lists in the game. Kinda the opposite of what you're saying?

[Necromorph]

Wow, way to escalate into personal attacks. Not cool man, not cool.

Rofl, love when people use dirty forum tactics and then get pissy when they get called out...priceless.

P.s. You weren't the only person I was refering too.

Anehoo, on to Hamelin.

I agree with making summoning a Stolen a cast. However, I think it should be a relatively low cast. When he dies, he only has a Ca of 3, making it rough to make more Stolen. "Why is this bad?" You ask. Well, despite the debuffs that Stolen throw out, many people will still target them regardless of the debuffs and kill them, and they are very very easy to kill with their wopping 1 wound. If you can nuke all the Stolen (Not hard knowing he has to cast to make more), then Hamelin will be on the back foot the whole game trying not to get killed while he tries to make more Stolen. Sure this gives you an easy way to beat him, but it may be too easy...we'd have to play test it. I don't mean crushing victory, but make him stall for too long and unable to move forward an engage due to the risk of getting Nuked with no way to come back. Who knows.

I also agree with Ratty on making Bully a Wp->Wp duel, would definitely help a lot without making the ability useless.

The only concern I see with adding too many changes to his in regards to duels/test/casts, etc, is that he's already a very hand restricted Master. Making him burn extra cards severely gimps his ability to cast when he needs to, and as someone who already has terrible luck with clutch flips, not having anything in your hand time and time again would be frustrating at best.

[Drake]

Ash I don't get what your point is - the first post was about how hard it is to prep against "Outcast" because you don't know which master it will be and they play very, very differently. In a fixed master list if your opponent has Hamelin you know exactly what he'll be taking and his is one of the most restrictive lists in the game. Kinda the opposite of what you're saying?

Magic, yeah I can see where my message might have been misunderstood.

What I meant was, because of the nature of some Masters, once they are declared, they are stuck with them. Ophelia for instance. If you then get drawn to play Hamelin, there is little you can do to mitigate due to the nature of the Master and the synergies they want/need to be effective with certain minions.

The approach you referred to I presumed was for a 55ss list you can pick and choose from to make 35ss crew. As that normally is only restricted by Faction, you can take an alternative Master, hence your comment about Neverborn not worrying too much about the restricted ss pool of models due to the versatility of the Neverborn masters, rather than say Arcanist or some Outcast Masters.

Hope that makes what I was trying to say clearer, although it is a bit wordy!..:tongue-ti

[Drake]

The only concern I see with adding too many changes to his in regards to duels/test/casts, etc, is that he's already a very hand restricted Master. Making him burn extra cards severely gimps his ability to cast when he needs to, and as someone who already has terrible luck with clutch flips, not having anything in your hand time and time again would be frustrating at best.

I have noticed a few comments along the line of him bing card restricted...I dont really get this point....

Don't get me wrong, I know he doesnt get to draw any cards during draw phase after first turn, but he has 2 very good mitigating ways to deal with this.

1. Obedient Wretch allows you to draw 1 card per turn.This allows atleast 1 card v most other Masters 6.

2. and by far more potent is his mechanic for opponent cheating. This is a win/win/win/win as far as I can see for 4 reasons;

i) Everytime your opponent uses a Control card, you gain 1, offsetting the lack of cards he naturally has. If your opponent has an extra large control hand and uses all of them in a turn, you get just as many to use! This means he can keep up with any master in the game for control cards.

ii) Your opponent will be loath to cheat in cards to perform non essential, but useful, abilities, such as Lure for example, or Grow or any number of useful but not turn critical actions. This again means your lack of cards is not a disbenefit because you gain by there hesitation.

iii) When your opponent does cheat for something you get to draw a card from either your discardpile or fate deck. If you have a Red Joker or other high card, your opponent cant afford to cheat theirs, as you will be able to just pick up the high card and imediately prevent their attack anyway, or atleast have a high card guaranteed to use later in the game. Even without a high card on the discard pile you still get to draw an unkown card which could be high.

iiii) Lastly, in any given turn you are actually likely to have more cards than your opponent. End of first turn you still have 6 cards as nothing to use for normally. Then everytime your oppoent cheats you gain 1 putting you another card higher than your hand size. At the end of the turn, if you still have all or most of your cards, again your opponent will be giving you a control hand size advantage by cheating any cards giving you more. This is a very useful thing for more than 1 reason.

So to summarise, I do not see this mechanic of his as a disadvantage, but an advantage, and when considering other discussions about balance, I do not feel this mechanic of his should be argued in his defence as something that makes him weaker. Quite the contrary.

Happy as usual to discuss. maybe their is something i'm not seeing or a perspective I havent considered, but from my experience to date this certainly seems like an advantageous mechanic of his.

[ZiggyQubert]

I have noticed a few comments along the line of him bing card restricted...I dont really get this point....

Don't get me wrong, I know he doesnt get to draw any cards during draw phase after first turn, but he has 2 very good mitigating ways to deal with this.

1. Obedient Wretch allows you to draw 1 card per turn.This allows atleast 1 card v most other Masters 6.

2. and by far more potent is his mechanic for opponent cheating. This is a win/win/win/win as far as I can see for 4 reasons;

i) Everytime your opponent uses a Control card, you gain 1, offsetting the lack of cards he naturally has. If your opponent has an extra large control hand and uses all of them in a turn, you get just as many to use! This means he can keep up with any master in the game for control cards.

ii) Your opponent will be loath to cheat in cards to perform non essential, but useful, abilities, such as Lure for example, or Grow or any number of useful but not turn critical actions. This again means your lack of cards is not a disbenefit because you gain by there hesitation.

iii) When your opponent does cheat for something you get to draw a card from either your discardpile or fate deck. If you have a Red Joker or other high card, your opponent cant afford to cheat theirs, as you will be able to just pick up the high card and imediately prevent their attack anyway, or atleast have a high card guaranteed to use later in the game. Even without a high card on the discard pile you still get to draw an unkown card which could be high.

iiii) Lastly, in any given turn you are actually likely to have more cards than your opponent. End of first turn you still have 6 cards as nothing to use for normally. Then everytime your oppoent cheats you gain 1 putting you another card higher than your hand size. At the end of the turn, if you still have all or most of your cards, again your opponent will be giving you a control hand size advantage by cheating any cards giving you more. This is a very useful thing for more than 1 reason.

So to summarise, I do not see this mechanic of his as a disadvantage, but an advantage, and when considering other discussions about balance, I do not feel this mechanic of his should be argued in his defence as something that makes him weaker. Quite the contrary.

Happy as usual to discuss. maybe their is something i'm not seeing or a perspective I havent considered, but from my experience to date this certainly seems like an advantageous mechanic of his.

Having played Hamelin this card mechanic is somewhat limiting, it is by no means terribla and situationly it can be good (if you have a high card on your discard pile for example) the main reason that it is not teriable is that he dosen't need to cheet mutch, it's not a necissety for him like it is for some masters (he generaly dosent need spicific suits and has very little that requires high cards) thus making summoning a stolen a spell or forcing him to discard a card would be more of a restriction to him then to other masters, not a huge on but certainly something.

Just watch out if it becomes a spell, as you wouldent want the obident wretch casting it as well

[Necromorph]

Eh...I've found it to be somewhat limiting, but not umplayable or 'bad' by any means. Good opponents know that he has trouble getting cards, and if you have a bad starting hand, it makes it even tougher. So, they will only cheat when necessary or when there is a very high chance that something bad will happen if they don't win.

Against new opponents (or unexperience against Hamelin) I never have a problem with cards because they will just cheat away on everything, giving me a good flow of cards. It is generally impossible to avoid cheating alltogether but you can do a "triage" so to speak on your flips to determine what flips are acceptable to win and lose.

I guess I was a bit vague on it earlier...it's by no means bad as it currently stands. However, adding too many extra test/duels/casts to his existing abilites will force him to burn more cards from an already limited hand, and then it will become a problem.

Edited June 15, 2011 by Necromorph

[Sandwich]

Making (1)Lure Malifaux Citizen a spell would be difficult to balance.

He relies on creating Stolen often.

If you make it a (0) spell to stop the Obedient Wretch from casting it, he will never be able to use either of his other 0 actions, this would make Hamelin very limited and underpowered.

Or he could be made (+1)Instinctual, at which point the most viable strategy would be to start with 8-10 Stolen and use (0)Useless Toy and (0)Fate is Meaningless every single activation to dish out lethal amounts of punishment, this would make Hamelin overpowered.

Making (1)Lure Malifaux Citizen a (1) spell could very well work to balance him out, but it would make him far too reliant on casting spells, and as Ratty said, hard counters aren't fun.

Picture playing Hamelin in a tournament versus Sonia Criid, or any guild crew with Witchling Stalkers.

I'm sure there's quite a few other crews that can destroy a spell caster crew, and if Hamelin could not produce Stolen at the same rate at which they were destroyed, it would be game over.

The point isn't to cuddle him into the ground, but to bring him on par with everyone else, so I'm not honestly sure how balanced or imbalanced this decision would be.

To make it a (2) action is just not a good idea period for obvious reasons.

As for making Bully a Wp->Wp duel, I feel that that would not work at all to bring him down.

He still has a Wp of 8, he still can easily drop a lot of model's wp by 4, and he still has Nix giving to non-soulless.

If it were say, an opposed flip, highest card wins, then maybe.

I honestly can't say how to balance it without ruining Hamelin.

[Ratty]

Er Sandwich, Sonnia can't stop it, Advanced counterspell wouldn't stop it as it wouldn't be targeting one of Criid's models and Nullify Magic is only a 6" aura I can't see Sonnia or a Witchling getting within 6" of Hamelin without dying. So I don't see anti-magic crews being much more of an issue than they are currently.

Just make the spell once per Crew per turn, that means you can cast it with your pet totem but you can't cast it twice.

As for Bully, yes it would be hard to get through a Wp->Wp duel with Hamelin, but any duel is better than not having a chance at all. Most of the time you won't want to do it, but if your Strategy needs you to kill him it would still be possible to brute force it.

Edited June 16, 2011 by Ratty

[Fetid Strumpet]

Or make it like the showgirls version of harmless. A static target number that must be met if a Ht 1 or insignificant model wants to target him. I 100% agree with Ratty that any duel is better than no chance, I argued for such earlier in the thread. That said, my personal preference in fixing this issue would be this. Or perhaps make Bully make Hamelin Terrifying 14 to all Ht1 and insignificant models.

[Omenbringer]

The resist for Bully should be a simple WP duel against a static number similar to Ruffian rather than an opposed WP vs WP duel. To keep it seperate from Ruffian give it a flip.

Maybe the simplist "fix" for Lure Malifaux Citizen is to make The Stolen Unique again. That way he can only have one in play at a time, ever (this doesn't really hinder him much since he can still just park it deep in his deployment zone behind some nice cover). I wouldn't mind keeping Lure Malifaux Citizen as a 1 action without a casting cost or sacrifice requirement if he could only have one and had to play a little closer to the chest.

[Drake]

The resist for Bully should be a simple WP duel against a static number similar to Ruffian rather than an opposed WP vs WP duel. To keep it seperate from Ruffian give it a flip.

I don't agree with this suggestion. Putting the test on a negative flip is bad for 2 reasons.

1 being it might as well be impossible for models to target him, as the negative flip will almost guarantee models will always fail the test. Even Wp7 models will struggle on a flip, and we are talking about the full range of models, inc gremlins which are not renowned for high Wp.

2 being that it prevents the opponent cheating to pass the test. This is not good for either player, as it doesnt allow the attacker to attempt to pull off the attack via brute force as Ratty put it, and also doesnt allow Hamelins mechanic of extra cards kick in, as not cheating means he wont get the chance to draw an extra card. Lose/Lose IMO

[Math Mathonwy]

Rofl, love when people use dirty forum tactics and then get pissy when they get called out...priceless.

You've got to be kidding me. Are you, like, twelve or something? Yeah, you go rolling on your floor as much as you like.

P.s. You weren't the only person I was refering too.

And you somehow believe that this makes what you said better? Wow. Never thought I'd have a need to use the browser plug-in to ignore list someone on the Wyrd forums, but my patience with childish personal attacks has been getting kinda lower the older I get. Bye-bye.

As for Bully, would it be a crazy idea to allow the opposing model to override it for an activation (or action) by discarding a card from hand?

Edited June 16, 2011 by Math Mathonwy