Beating the Guild

[Toonook]

Hi all. I'm starting to play Arcanists as my main faction, having had a good run with my Ressers. I'm only going to be using Colette, Rasputina and Kaeris, and am a little intimidated to be facing the guild quite a bit as they're the main faction represented amongst my playing group. We announce masters at the start of the game before flipping for strategies rather than factions, so that just adds to it a bit!

I managed to narrowly score a win against Perdita last night with Raspy, but am not sure how I'm going to deal with Hoffman and Sonnia with their respective blast denial and counter spell, along with Sonnia's ability to target my master without LoS. Add in a liberal helping of hunter amongst their crews and it's hard to use the silent one to bounce spells through since to be able to see them, they'll be able to see her, and the Perdita and Sonnia players love their Nino.

So how do you win games with Raspy and Colette against the Guild?

[Boardgameguy]

Ok, this is just weird. I came to this forum to post a similar question. Don't mean to hijack the thread but I'm having the same issues. Played against Perdita yesterday twice in preparation for an upcoming tourney next weekend.

I'm just having issues with these ranged crews. I.e. Niño and the Austringers that can nail you so far away. Even with Colette's speed your still going to take damage till you get to them.

I see Raspy having an easier time cause she can camp and cast ice pillars and Decembers curse. Both games yesterday I think I perhaps got more aggressive than I should but I just didn't want to camp in my deployment area, but maybe that's what I have to do depending on the strategy.

I did have an idea to run up Colette and try to turn Niño into a Manequin but the cards weren't helping. Using the doves could work. Summon a dove then try to magicians duel Niño.

With Raspy I thought that perhaps running Snowstorm up and drawing in niño with his spell, and he's also a spirit so he won't get beat on too bad.

The problem I was having is that he was taking an enslaved Nephlim and would obey niño then have niño would take his action and continue wailing on my crew.

Not sure if any of that helped but I'm curious to see where this thread goes.

[pixelante]

With Colette you can draw Nino in with the Performers lure and then hit him a few times with Colettes Magicians Duel or Discharge Soulstone. Otherwise you need to try and stay out of sight and get your opponent to move into your zone of influence rather than play the range game. The Austringer despite its range has low damage that you can easily heal with healing flips from the Mannequin or Cassandra using the Mannequins spell.

[geistwald]

This game is supposed to be terrain-intensive. Place and use walls, forests, whatnot to block LoS and give you cover. Ice pillars with flame walls help a lot. In my experience, ranged Guild crews steal the show where people still build WHFB or Warmachine style boards. Otherwise, they aren't half as scary.

[Toonook]

But even with plenty of terrain, you still need to move your ice mirror target or raspy herself to have line of sight on someone, and with the lack of companion they get a turn to either gun you down or hide.

[geistwald]

What I mean is they can't really outrange Rasputina and Kaeris, except for the obvious tricks and sniping positions which also lock them in place. Activating in companion is a double-edged weapon: they can shoot unwary enemies for sure, but they also get out-activated easily. (If they activate en masse to hide, good for you...) I don't know your crew builds, neither your opponents', but Perdita usually wins by slaughtering the enemy, not by collecting more VP's a smart way. It's you who has better tools for the latter.

[Boardgameguy]

but Perdita usually wins by slaughtering the enemy, not by collecting more VP's a smart way. It's you who has better tools for the latter.

Very true. It seems when I run against Perdita I'm going against trying not to get tabled or slaughtered, regardless of what the strategy is.

[Shadai]

Yeah, I'll echo what some of the others have said. You need more terrain.

You should be able to duck and cover all the way to their side of the board if need be. But really, Colette's crew is so fast it really doesn't matter. They might get a shot off before you are all over them.

Raspy and Kaeris on the other hand are something else entirely. Kaeris is faster then Raspy, Raspy is just painful to play against the guild. I probably wouldn't take her to play unless I was forced to. The problem with Raspy is she is A. Slow, and B. your typical Archanist master, meaning she does the great majority of her damage through spells. Sonnia is a nightmare for her, witchling stalkers and their anti magic aura often mean doom if they reach her.

Kaeris is a better choice. He can actually move with purpose unlike Raspy, and can clear out of those pesky anti-magic auras and light people up quickly. You'll need ways to spread the burning counter love to make him really tick, however. I would suggest Fire Gamin at least. I would also look to the new stuff. Metal Gamin can spread the burning token love, and since they are constructs, Kaeris can blow them to spread even more counters. Even the Rail Workers are good choices here, as they count as both living and construct. They can literally shovel burning tokens on people, and when they get low wounds, Kaeris can blow them up for even more.

But don't stop there. I can see using Mei Feng (my new crush) really successfully against the guild. She has hard hitting melee attacks, and with her ride the rails ability she can literally go from one side of the board to the other. This will allow her to move from cover, get into combat, blow stuff up, then ride the rails back to the safety of cover.

Lots of fun stuff here in Archanists now!