Colette List Advice

[Cadfan]

I know that I'm going to be playing the following 35 point list:

Lady Justice w. Scales of Justice

Judge

Executioner

Guard Captain

3x Death Marshals

4 soulstone cache

Should I run

Colette

Cassandra

2x Coryphee

Performer

Dove

7 soulstone cache

or should I run

Colette

Cassandra

2x Coryphee

2x Performer

3 soulstone cache

Neither one of us has any meaningful experience playing the game. I figure on the first turn I can make a dove and a soulstone (paid for by making a soulstone on that activation), no matter what, since his list is slow moving. So the first list will end up with 2 doves and 8 cache once combat starts, and the second list will have 1 dove and 4 cache.

Any suggestions?

[13th Warrior]

Colette lives and dies by her soulstones (as do many masters), I'd take the first list. It's pretty much the standard Colette list (this is a post of mine taken from another thread, hopefully it'll give you a couple of pointers):

The way I've run her pretty much since she came out is:

Colette

Mechanical Dove (2ss)

Cassandra (9ss)

2 x Coryphee (14ss)

Performer & Mannequin (6ss)

That comes in at 31ss, leaving 4 plus Colette's cache of 3 for a starting total of 7, which is much better.

You'll generally find, too, that for the first couple of turns you can afford to either burn 4 cards (2 in each activation) for an extra 2ss per turn, or burn 2 cards and create a Dove, leaving you with 11ss and a Dove or 9ss and 3 Doves.

Turns 3 and 4 often become pretty hectic and soulstone heavy, so you'll use a lot between the various models that have Use Soulstone, but if things go well, then in the last 2-3 turns you can start Magician's Duelling models to death and gaining soulstones that way.

I usually find that if things have gone well I have a healthy supply of soulstones left at the end of the game. Your problems start when you run out of soulstones by turn 4 or 5 - that's when the crew starts to fall apart.

The key with Colette (for my money) is to only commit soulstones when you know it'll be most effective (killing a model with Magician's Duel, going for the Mannequin Replacement trigger on Disappearing Act against a big gribbly, etc).

The other thing about Colette is to make sure you've always got a way out - don't let them get too far apart so you can swap places. They're not a crew that can go toe-to-toe with big hitters; I find they work superbly if you can hit and run with them rather than getting locked into melee.

I'm also going to be trying out a couple of variations using Kaeris and Johann instead of either the Coryphees or Cassandra. It's something that you may want to look at once you really understand the basic crew (and it's not an easy task to work them out - the first 35ss game I had using them took me about 3-4 hours and a very understanding opponent - and bear in mind that at that stage I was quite experienced at Malifaux!)

If it helps, here's a link to a battle report I posted after the UK Masters where I used Colette against Hoffman (okay it won't give you too much detail, especially against Lady J, but it should give you an idea of the mobility you need to maintain to keep the crew functioning as well as an insight into some of the sneaky tricks she can get up to.)

http://www.wyrd-games.net/showthread.php?28176-UK-Masters-Tournament-Report

(the Colette report is in the second post)

Cheers

Rob

[Shut Up]

I'm also going to be trying out a couple of variations using Kaeris and Johann instead of either the Coryphees or Cassandra. It's something that you may want to look at once you really understand the basic crew (and it's not an easy task to work them out - the first 35ss game I had using them took me about 3-4 hours and a very understanding opponent - and bear in mind that at that stage I was quite experienced at Malifaux!)

ahhhh, i like to see people not taking coryphee in a colette list I realy love them (in fact I own 8!) but they do make colette list building more of a formality than an actual decision, I worked out how to use the standard colette list to its fullest potential in the last game of the doubles last month but actualy find coryphee rather boring when i play the crew like that (cassie + coryphee +manaquin alpha strike/mirrors nastiness) am relay looking foreward to giving kaeris a go when I get round to buying her (looking more at ressers and guild at the moment)

personal opinion of mine though is that cassandra is key to a good colette crew, undertudy is awesome and she is damn fast. not to mention southern charm and he best rule *drumroll* grand finale, many crews realy struggle to take her down so moost tend not to try if there is a coryphee duet around, so when i play she tends to be around at the end of the game, the number of times i've grabbed a cheeky scheme for 2vps winning me a game with that ability.

on the topic of beginner colette lists I would go for the 'standard' list, it certainly best showcases the strenngths/weaknesses of the crew and sop should better teach you how to use all the pieces together, once youve had a few games and gotten your head round the crew id suggest trying some variants.

[Shadai]

I get the search function on these boards doesn't work very well, but sheesh... we have like 3 or 4 Colette advice threads on the front Arcanist page as it is. And oddly enough if you read them all, they offer all the same advice!

I'm gonna echo what Shut Up just said in that the first list is the "standard" Colette list, if anything is really "standard" in this game. Her crew is tricky, and wrapping your head around the basics is just what you need to do before tossing in curveballs like Angelica and Johan into the mix.