Lady J

[redben]

Had my first experience against Lady J today and it went predictably badly. Restore Natural Order was particularly effective and left me wondering whether it's worth filling your crew with living models if you think you might be facing her. Would this work and are there any in particular that will work well, mercenaries in particular?

[osoi]

What master were you using? Restore Natural Order ties her to one place and cuts down on any crew support she normally gives, if I have a little more info should be able to help out a bit more.

[Mr. Bigglesworth]

It really only works if you have a bunch of dogs and she can clear them and she is not playing against nico, and all graverobbers are activated. Also with executioner around she can blast dogs and have executioner wipe the counters off. I have used this once and it won the game, now I'm an avid lady j player but I have yet to use it since that one time.

Really need to know your crew and strategy to understand how this one spell that is an all action, that requires her to sit in the middle of your army is punishing you. Her scariest abilities are her damage output and her ability to deny counters, not much a living crew will help with.

[Murphy'sLawyer]

I see Seamus in your Sig and he does not need Corpses as much as your McM. If you are using McM and she is denying you Body Parts you will be hurting and may need to find a way to pick up and use the counters fast.

But as the others mention post your list and models, it is hard to give advise without seeing what you are using.

[redben]

I was using McMourning but I deliberately left it vague as I have Seamus and Nicodem too. I have some ideas of things I would do differently but I'm specifically only interested in advice as to using living models and mercenaries against her and cutting down on the undead. Was just wondering if it was a viable strategy and which ones would work best.

[osoi]

Whether for good or bad keeping it vague doesnt help so much with Malifaux if you playing with all the crew selection criteria.

If I were up against Lady J (knowing beforehand) I would look at models other than lots of Canines (in general a good idea anyway) Belles manipulate your opponents models and are good for all the Book 1 resser masters.

If you are set about going down the route of using only living models I would look at Von Schill and his Freikorps.

[redben]

Thanks . Like I say I wasn't looking on advice on playing a crew, just on whether a primarily living crew was a viable option.

[Mr. Bigglesworth]

I would say no, resser do best with high model counts to get more counters. Her 3wd ability is only a threat if your all bunched, have a lot mindless zombies or dogs in range and again your graverobbers already activated.

Resser pay a premium for almost all living models, the only heaps out there are desperate mercs, who are fantastic. If you are going with mass living they are the only ones I would recommend. I can't see freikorps working out at all. They are too expensive as mercs. Lady J is hard to play against not just because of her antiundead but also because her ability to almost ignore hard to wound, and her extraordinary damage capacity.

She sucks against ranged attacks so focus building a crew with a ranged capacity. Desperate need will help, even a convict gushing, then crooked men. Low cb guns work fine, it is mass fire that will burn her ss cache. She can take some hits, but with mcmourning and Seamus on the board she can't take to much because of their high damage capacity.

Edited September 14, 2011 by Mr. Bigglesworth

[huntroll]

I would say no, resser do best with high model counts to get more counters. Her 3wd ability is only a threat if your all bunched, have a lot mindless zombies or dogs in range and again your graverobbers already activated.

Resser pay a premium for almost all living models, the only heaps out there are desperate mercs, who are fantastic. If you are going with mass living they are the only ones I would recommend. I can't see freikorps working out at all. They are too expensive as mercs. Lady J is hard to play against not just because of her antiundead but also because her ability to almost ignore hard to wound, and her extraordinary damage capacity.

Only one of our 4 masters really need corpse counters for summoning. McM can get Body Parts by Dissecting Dogs and saccing his totem on turn 1, and Seamus is not the best summoner around...

I have to disagree about not including living models, from the Mercs the Convict with Belles is amazing, Von Schill is also worth his 10 points (though no Mercs then), and you already mentioned the awesomeness of Desperate Mercs (and if you add a Nurse...). Sebastian is also decent imho.

The key thing about defeating LadyJ is not letting her in melee with your master, and either attacking her first with some high-damaging model (I have simply Dissected her with McM in one game after she killed half my army with Restore Nature Order), or slowly plinking her Wounds away (Seamus, Von Schill or a Convict would do well). She has horrible defensive stats, and no means of her own to get into melee quickly. Sure, she can take Lucius or get a Marshal to Pine Box her, but you will most likely out-activate her and be able to protect your master or simply kill her (because you will have an activation between Lucius/Marshal and Lady J), or the Guardian to protect, but then she will be even slower.

To be honest when playing Ressers (I usually play McMourning) I fear Sonnia more than LadyJ. Justice only counters Nicodem, while Sonnia counters Lure (one of our greatest strenghts imho) and McMourning's damaging spells with her Counterspell, and blasts Kirai's crew apart with Immolation. Not to mention that Immolation is even better vs. Nico's swarms than Restore Natural Order.

Edited September 14, 2011 by huntroll

[osoi]

Sonnia is my most feared as well as she can target our high Ca masters without LoS (amongst other things)

[kanhead]

I really dislike Perdita of all the Guild masters, just for the fact that my line is shot apart. Sonnia is slow and easily overpowered in melee and Justice (while hitting very hard) can only do so much with her actions. McM and a belle can comfortably deal with her crew while your crew whittles away at Lady J and wastes her actions. If they group together then you go for the objectives. In short, don't play her game.

[huntroll]

I really dislike Perdita of all the Guild masters, just for the fact that my line is shot apart. Sonnia is slow and easily overpowered in melee and Justice (while hitting very hard) can only do so much with her actions. McM and a belle can comfortably deal with her crew while your crew whittles away at Lady J and wastes her actions. If they group together then you go for the objectives. In short, don't play her game.

You are totally right, Perdita is another good master against us, mostly because our Cb-s are generally low... Fortunately most players take her with a lot of family members, who are squishy, vulnerable in melee and expensive. This way we can out-activate a list like that, kill the other family members first, then overwhelm Perdita with swarms of minions and maybe even summons (hint: she doesn't like a Rogue Necromancy summoned in her face after she activated that turn ). But against a Perdita list using more of the awesome 3-5 SS minions (Hounds, Marshals, Stalkers, the dreaded Austringers) and only a 1-2 Family models we have a bit harder time, but still, she is beatable with the clever use of terrain and Strategies/Schemes.