Sonnia Box Set, what next? some thoughts

[HaggisMcMutton]

I posted this on my local gaming club's website to help out a new player. Thought I'd add it here too if it can be helpful for anyone else. Just my personal opinions and thoughts here, feel free to take my humble advice or ignore my ramblings.

Zack, I believe his name is, asked what he should buy for his sonnia box set to get at least up to 35 stones. Here is some of my thoughts...hope this helps.

Perdita Box set. Sonnia's and Perdita's box set can work well together. you get 25 stones worth of models in the box set, which can give you up to 45 stones of minions and 2 masters, total. Nino is a solid long range shooter, Papa Loco is a lot of fun, and can make some interesting explosion chains with exploding witchling stalkers. Fransico is a solid 5 SS melee model. Santiago is an awesome shooter with paired pistols and gets better when he is at 4 wounds or less remaining. All of these models can work and work well with Sonnia.

In C.Hoffman's box set, 2 models stand out. The Guardian is a 7 Stone model that is great at protecting other models. He can cast a spell on another friendly model which makes it able to transfer wounds to it, then it has a zero action that can heal himself. Then the watcher. OMG I love the watcher. For 3 stones you get: a significant model, a 6 inch walk with flight guild model (guild is generally fairly slow, so a 6 inch move is good for a guild model), a 1 action and a 2 action that allows you to look at the top 1 or 2 cards of your deck, then put them back on either top or bottom!, its ranged strike that at best only does 1 damage but it can remove terrifying, harmless or pitiful. So basically it can be an objective grabber, a deck manipulator, and a terrifying remover, all for 3 soulstones. Did I mention I love the watcher?

Lady Justice's box set is also worth considering. You get 21 stones worth of minions. Lady J is a solid master. The death marshals are good models at only 4 stones a piece, good at both shooting and melee. The Judge is also a solid model, but in my personal experience it seems like I'd rather spend the 7 stones on other things, there are other things I need more in my crews and the Judge is left out in the cold. But experiences can vary.

Another pack of witchling stalkers wouldn't hurt, but I'd for sure not get that right now. The thinking is if you take 2 or 3 stalkers in your crew, you have plenty of models for if/when you get off a successful violation of magic and create new stalkers. In casual games I'm sure a proxy would work in a bind. Or if you wanna take more than 3 stalkers, which could be fun.

Pack of fire gamin. 3 fire gamin at 4 soulstones a piece. They have an ability that allows these arcanist models to be hired by Sonnia. Their big advantage is they give out burning counter when either they hit enemy models or when they take a hit in melee, the attacking model takes a wound plus a burning counter. So really you would want them only if you are taking avatar sonnia in your crew.

Avatar Sonnia. really good avatar to have; one of the better avatars for sure. but it only adds 2 soulstones to your crew and costs $40, so I'd recommend other purchases first to get yourself up to 35 stones. She gives out burning counters and has a spell that does damage for all enemy models with burning counters within a 10 inch pulse. Some different abilities from normal Sonnia, so keep that in mind.

Lucious's box set can all work with Sonnia, plus Lucious himself is a henchman so you can hire him into your Sonnia crew. But unless there is something specific one of these models would add to your crew that you want to do, I'd avoid for now. There are better first buy options for Sonnia. Ryle can be good tho.

The witchling Handler is a good one to use if you bring several witchling stalkers in your crew. Brutal effigy is a solid model. Models like the executioner and the exorcists are good models, but are for sure more situational models. Executioner is nasty in melee and when he kills an enemy model, he heals all up. But he has a defense of 3, so you really got to be careful with him, or do a cheesy trick of having a death marshal pine box him, then have the death marshal (who has a walk of 4 versus the executioner's walk of 3)walk up the field while in effect protecting the executioner from getting hit until he pops out. Exorcists you basically only want to use if your opponent is a resurrectionist. Austringers are good fortheir mad crazy long range that can ignore cover saves and LOS. I'd stay away from the Peacekeeper model, good but you really only want to use him with hoffman.

Sonnia's totem, purifying flame. Meh. That basically sums it up. When you avatar, you lose your totem, so if you plan on eventually getting and using the avatar regularly, skip buying the totem. The totem has a low casting and does not have a tome, so if you want to use magical extension to cast one of Sonnia's spells, it is gonna be really really hard to successfully cast it. The totem's strengths are that it is more survivable and can dish out at least some damage with its ranged and melee attacks. View it as more of a regular model that can melee strike and range strike, not for helping Sonnia cast spells. Could be a good defender or a counter-attacker, keeping it near Sonnia for defensive purposes, but if you plan on doing that there are better model options to fill that role.

In conclusion, I'd say the best and well rounded first purchases for Sonnia's box set would be part or all of Perdita's box set, the watcher, and the guardian. After this then maybe look into picking up the avatar, and/or the other models mentioned that you didn't buy the first time around. I play and know Sonnia quite well, but of course this is just my own thoughts and opinions. Hope this helps!