Advice on using Sorrows

[redben]

I'm playing an out of the box Legion of Sorrows at the moment and I'm having a bit of difficulty with the Sorrows. It seems like they'd be most effective using the (1) spells of models they're linked to and Pandora's (0) actions but for them to have a LoS I'm having to activate the linked model first and leave it out in the open. If I don't then when I activate the Sorrow it can't see anything. Does anyone have any advice?

[pgbsamurai]

Emotional Stress tends to be seen as the Sorrow's key ability. With a Pandora crew you want to make your opponent make and fail as many will power duals as possible. To make Emotional Stress work though you need to have Sorrow within 3" of the target. So often times you will have them closer to the front lines. While Siphon Magic can be useful, keep in mind that Sorrows have a CA on the lower side which can restrict what they can effectively cast. Melancholy can force your opponent's model to have a negative flip on all flips, including WP which will help you do more damage. Doldrums can also help, when you have your Sorrow so close to melee paralyzing something means it can't hit you for the turn.

[notmikehill]

Most skilled players will see Sorrows as key targets. They will often times snipe them out of your crew first knowing that they can severely mess up willpower duels. However, if you link them to a friendly woe and walk them up the board you can hide them somewhere until they safely get to an enemy model and do some damage!

[OtherSpencer]

I stick a sorrow to each Pandy, Kade, and Candy. With Pandy they help with trauma and also give her something to throw wounds onto if for some reason someone gets past the willpower duel to target her. With Kade and Candy they are height 1 while the sorrow is height 2 so they can freely cast Doldrums or Lure (Kade) and Self Loathing (Candy). Again like with Pandora they are also great for pushing wounds off on. My favorite things about sorrows have been turn 1 where the first 3 activations are my sorrows linking and I get to see what my opponent is doing. I'm no expert and I'm also just learning this crew, but that's what has worked for me so far. Also don't forget when they are linked and you are "pushing" them back into base contact it doesn't have to be the shortest route it just has to put them back into base contact so you could put them up side by side and have the LoS if you needed it. Just be careful of AoEs.

[karn987]

What everyone else said

The key parts to effective Sorrow use is understand Link, Emotional Stress, and their role on the board.

Link is basically what makes the Sorrows work, without it they are junk. So maximizing your use of this ability is key. The important principals to understand is that:

• Both models stay linked till they end a turn not in B2B with each other.
  
• The Sorrow wants to stay close to the model it is linked to.
  
• The Sorrow can push any distance and along any legal path to it's linked model
  

Then if the Sorrow is linked to Pandora, you need to remember it will only push when she takes a Wk action or ends her activation. It will not push to her while she is moving around via Fading Memories push effect. So you need to time your Pacify/Incites with her so that she can Wk once and bring all the Sorrows linked to her, right up where she needs them.

Another important bit is that they are indeed, not tough. They are very dangerous with Pandora, but learned players will do their best to take them down first. This can be a good thing! They are eating up damage that could otherwise be dirrected at say Pandora, Kade, or Candy. So it's not always a bad thing that they attract all the fire on the field. But to keep them alive, hiding is the name of the game. You make sure to keep them out of LOS or behind cover and do your best to steer them clear of anyone with a Blast generating attack.

So with this in mind, it is entirely possible for a Sorrow to never get a turn in LOS of an opponent yet still be extremely effective thanks to Emotional Stress. You bring Sorrows mainly for this passive effect and for Martyr fodder for models like Pandora, Kade, and Candy. Their actions are used basically as back ups and should not be relied upon. Every now and then you will find yourself in range of one of them and you may as well use it. But more often then not, you will get a chance to use them when your on hte defensive. Ie when something tries to bum rush you and doesn't kill the Sorrows or tries to kill the model they are linked to instead. So thats when you use their spells and what not, but otherwise don't worry about it. They weren't ment to be the most active model in the game, it's their passive effect which makes them amazing.

In all honesty, you probably will rarely use the (0) actions of pandora with the Sorrows because she wants to be the one to put Pacify/Incite on the opponent (fading memory remember!). So it's not a big deal really, its more of an incase thing truthfully. You will have some more use for them if your doing doppelganger shenanigans with Pandora.

So basically in the end, don't worry about their activations all that much. They are not meant to do a ton actively, but have some great options for when they do. Often I use them to buy me activations, activating them when they are hidden to try and wear down my opponents important activations. So in that sense, they are again very useful.

[redben]

Thanks

[magicpockets]

I'm playing an out of the box Legion of Sorrows at the moment and I'm having a bit of difficulty with the Sorrows....Does anyone have any advice?

1. Buy a Doppleganger and spam emotional trauma.

2. Find new friends.