Making Seamus Work [Beginner Help Thread]

[IntereoVivo]

The intent of this thread is to help beginners (like me). In order to capitalize on all the fantastic advice given I am going to try to condense it here in the first post. That way new Seamus players don't have to dig through the whole thread to find the gems.

My original post:

Open Spoiler

Since starting Ressers a couple months back I've played Seamus exclusively and have achieved the proud record of 0 and 7. During those 7 losses I have managed to kill 2 enemy models and have not managed to win a single Terrifying check. Did I mention I've been using aSeamus for the last 4 games?

Obviously I'm doing something wrong. Or more accurately, many somethings very wrong.

I'd like advice on a couple different aspects of the game.

1) Crew: I am suspecting that part of my issue is that I bring the wrong models for the job. I currently have:

Seamus

aSeamus

Madame Sybelle

3x Belle

Grave Spirit

Bete Noir

2x The Hanged

Jack Daw

2x Canine Remains

Shikome

Datsue-Ba

2x Onryo

What am I missing? Should I bring aSeamus with a belle or two and Von Shill?

2) Playstyle: I was under the impression that Seamus is fairly good in Melee. It would seem that I was mistaken, though my only real comparisons have been 10T Misaki (4 of he games), Taylor and some of the other 10T models. Due to that assumption I've been playing him a bit aggressively, not necessarily leading the charge but close behind. So far that has got me extra dead in every game (I've manifested twice, each time dieing the next turn).

Thoughts on how to use him?

3) Strategies: I have not been able to find anything that Seamus is actually good at. Maybe Bodyguard?

What do you take?

Thanks in advance

Crew

(Models commonly found in a Seamus crew ranked in order of popularity)

aSeamus - Considered a staple, gives increased control and damage at the cost of range and surviability

Rotten Belle - A super stable minion used for a cheap body and board control

Night Terrors - Cheap and fast, good for objective grabbing and defense against Ranged

Crooked Men - Board control and more bodies

The Drowned - Decent control with AoE damage, mostly used as shields/deterents

Grave Spirit - Best totem for Seamus as it combos well with most of his heavy hittters

Dead Rider - Strong beat-stick with excellent threat range, don't bring without Grave Spirit

Bete Noir - Strong beat-stick that is excellent for taking out a back line or keeping models locked down

The Hanged - Used in terror based crews, survivable and has decent control

Onryo - Used in terror based crews, has decent control, very useful against Immune to Influence

Izamu - Strong beat-stick and excellent defense, model not released, has strong potential

Chiaki - Good support, model not released, has strong potential

Playing Seamus

The following is a selection of responses from throughout this thread. Right now they're all just tossed together, but I will be going through, removing redundancy and condensing them into a clean, easy to read format. Thanks for your patience.

Seamus is not a melee master he likes being close to the action but not in melee. Keeping a Belle back to lure him out of melee is always a nice option to have.

Body Guard is a great scheme to take as well as breakthrough as they both use a Seamus crew well and play to his strengths. If you can lower the enemy WP, your terror skills will work. Molly is a superb add on to Seamus and will do lots of set up for him. Try playing less power forward and think more mercurial, methodical slasher.

I focus too hard on the opposing Master. I also had this problem with McMourning. For some reason I always try to cut off the head of the opponent, rather than weakening their support network. Next match I'm going to be blasting away any minions I can with a cheated / soulstoned .50 shot to the face.

I forget to use my Belles to drag enemies out of position. The Belles seem really useful, but I haven't found a good time to use them. Typically because I activate them after Seamus, but that's the above issue all over again.

Seamus is capable of doing some really neat things with his Belles and his own debuffs he can apply. For example, I used Undead Psychosis last game who was engaged with my Belles and forced her to take off before she could do any more damage.

I say just pick off the enemies forces one by one and Seamus is an effective master. Oh and don't be afraid to use Soulstones to blow them up either. Most things won't come back from a 7 damage shot to the head.

Seamus stays somewhat central/back and gives his speed boost to the belles who I use for getting enemy off of objectives or pulled towards shafted-markers/melee attacks. Also lots of lure maneuvering of my own models.

None of that sort of crew is a particularly GREAT killer aside from Seamus with his Flintlock, so for me its usually about attrition, and picking off models. Death by paper cuts.

I do like Luring Seamus into Flintlock range of something so that he can get a good shot off and still have the actions remaining to get back out of danger. Never forget that lure works on FRIENDLY models too.

You need Drowned, Night Terrors, and Crooked Men. Seamus likes a large cache and does better with a pretty good sized durable crew. At least 1-2 Belles with him no matter what strat. I can't stress enough how freaking good Night Terrors are. use them for Obj Grabbing. Drowned are a board control land mine and make back their cost for me every game I use them. Always build to strategy. Crooked Men are some of rezzers best minions, Being able to paralyze on a Trigger gives Seamus more chances to Shoot them with his very very sexy gun.

The biggest mistake I see people making when they're playing rezzers is using their control hand on their minions. Saving all your high cards for Seamus or other key spells (like call belle) can win you games. The Belles are defense 3 so they're going to get hit, but their 8 wounds and hard to wound will normally ensure that it takes a while to actually get them off the board.

Playing Against....

(In this section I will be adding masters as I play against and get advice for them)

Perdita: I have yet to play against the Ortegas but some advice was given so I'm just passing the whole quote on until I have a chance to test.

Open Spoiler

Oof, I wouldn't be rushing into melee with Nino if I were you. The Executioner will tear your speedy models apart before the rest of your crew can support them.

Perdita is a problem for Seamus due to Immune to Influence (Stubborn on the others) and high Df - the thing she's actually most vulnerable to is Terrifying. Putting up Trail of Fear and The Face of Death makes it genuinely annoying for her and her crew to activate, forcing them to often burn high control cards and Soulstones, or fail and run away. It can be really disruptive, but it also leaves Seamus very vulnerable since he hates being in melee range, so it's best left until the later turns when their melee elements are closing on you (unless you have his Avatar attached, then go nuts).

The high Wp across the board makes it hard to Lure the Ortegas out of position - except Papa Loco, who you really don't want anywhere near you. (Luring Papa away from your main force and killing him is good if you can do it, though.) Other than Perdita, they have fairly low Df, so if you can drag them into range it's fairly easy for Seamus to hurt them very badly with a Focused shot.

Night Terrors are going to be your best friend in this match-up - not only will they do the heavy lifting in your objective grabs, they have an aura that debuffs shooting range in a big area (and Wp, with the trigger) - it's up to you whether you swarm at the enemy and force them to deal with the Night Terrors to protect the rest of your crew's advance, or try to keep them alive (and capping objectives) until you can engage, then add their Wp debuff to Seamus' to make those Terrifying checks damn near impossible.

The other important thing you'll have to deal with is the Executioner - he can be completely shut down by Seamus' Undead Psychosis, and he doesn't even get the benefits from Fear Not Death to resist it. Unfortunately Perdita can also remove it, so be wary of that. He's a marginally easier target to Lure than the Ortegas, but if you can't land Undead Psychosis on him (and make it stick) then it's generally a bad idea to bring him near your crew. (Sybelle can also shut him down with Rough Trade, but it's less reliable due to needing the extra Crow.) Basically, time it right and he's a pushover, screw it up and he'll put you in a world of hurt. He's also immune to Terrifying, which is always nice for Seamus.

Anyway, I wouldn't focus your efforts too much on winning at this stage - think of the games as a learning experience (about your own and particularly the enemy's crew). Understand yourself and the enemy first, and your own strategies will become apparent. Most of all, remember to have fun.

Edited December 7, 2012 by IntereoVivo
Updating

[osoi]

Okay I will try and address this as best I can with being strapped for time.

1. Your crew pool looks good to me, I like having the option of Crooked Men as well but it looks like a good pool to choose from, running 3 Canine Remains can also be useful too at times. I dont use them but Night Terrors can also be used to great effect. Can you tell me what you used in each game and what the strats were as that would help a lot.

2. Seamus is not a melee master he likes being close to the action but not in melee. Keeping a Belle back to lure him out of melee is always a nice option to have.

3. Schemes depend on the strategy you are playing I tend to try and align my schemes a lot with my strategies to keep me focussed

[naz9]

It's possible you're being too aggresive with him. He needs his Belles and other models to move the enemy around to 'deal' with them. He's the center spider in the web you build. You prolly shouldn't use his terror ability without some enemy debuffs. Crooligins within 3" -1 WP, the Carrion Effigy removes Immunities, his cheated .50 will blow 65% of models away. Live for pain is great and remember, use other models to kill too. Bete Noir is the real deal and any model killed within 6" of the hatter will heal him and he can draw a card...lots of ways to use him without just charging across the board. His CB is 5..not terribly high so pick your spots. Try to use his minions to weaken the foe, then finish them off with Seamus.

Body Guard is a great scheme to take as well as breakthru as they both use a Seamus crew well and play to his strengths. If you can lower the enemy WP, your terror skills will work. Molly is a superb add on to Seamus and will do lots of set up for him. Try playing less power forward and think more mercurial, methodical slasher.

[ravenborne]

Seamus plays well like his narrative stories. Keep him out of the direct action, running around, dodging and sniping, murmuring isolated victims. When the cops pin him down, he goes crazy and avatars out. Make sure he has as few wounds as possible before this happens.

Use his belles for board control. This can be to move Seamus out of harms way out to move enemy's into his.

Might I ask which Masters you have played against and what the strategies were?

[Rhonlore]

I have used Seamus for all of two games, but here are places I failed.

I focus too hard on the opposing Master. I also had this problem with McMourning. For some reason I always try to cut off the head of the opponent, rather than weakening their support network. Next match I'm going to be blasting away any minions I can with a cheated / soulstoned .50 shot to the face.

I forget to use my Belles to drag enemies out of position. The Belles seem really useful, but I haven't found a good time to use them. Typically because I activate them after Seamus, but that's the above issue all over again.

Seamus is capable of doing some really neat things with his Belles and his own debuffs he can apply. For example, I used Undead Psychosis last game who was engaged with my Belles and forced her to take off before she could do any more damage.

I say just pick off the enemies forces one by one and Seamus is an effective master. Oh and don't be afraid to use Soulstones to blow them up either. Most things won't come back from a 7 damage shot to the head.

[Gruesome]

Always tailor to strats and schemes.

For many strats, I find that I like lots of Soul Stones, Sybelle+Grave Spirit, Rotten Belles and Crooked Men.

Seamus stays somewhat central/back and gives his speed boost to the belles who I use for getting enemy off of objectives or pulled towards shafted-markers/melee attacks. Also lots of lure maneuvering of my own models.

None of that sort of crew is a particularly GREAT killer aside from Seamus with his Flintlock, so for me its usually about attrition, and picking off models. Death by papercuts.

I do like Luring Seamus into Flintlock range of something so that he can get a good shot off and still have the actions remaining to get back out of danger. Never forget that lure works on FRIENDLY models too.

I'd also suggest not letting Lillith charge him.

[Omenbringer]

Seamus is an ambush predator. Playing him to agressively early will result in a very dead Seamus. Spam the Belles Lure spell to bring key models in and then have the crew feast upon them. With his movement buffs (especially when combined with Molly's) the crew can hold off on pushing to accomplish objectives until the later turns.

[Blog]

You need Drowned, Night Terrors, and Crooked Men. Seamus likes a large cache and does better with a pretty good sized durable crew. At least 1-2 Belles with him no matter what strat. I can't stress enough how freaking good Night Terrors are. use them for Obj Grabbing. Drowned are a board control land mine and make back their cost for me every game I use them. Always build to strategy. Crooked Men are some of rezzers best minions, Being able to paralyze on a Trigger gives Seamus more chances to Shoot them with his very very sexy gun.

[Omenbringer]

Seamus likes a large cache and does better with a pretty good sized durable crew.

It is very difficult to accomplish these two goals at the same time. Some seem to always try to max out the cache (which will diminish crew numbers), I prefer a much lower one (though I started playing with Outcasts so a cache of 2-3 is huge to me and has definately skewed my perspective).

[Blog]

Seamus 35ss 7 cache Supply Wagon

+ Seamus, Avatar of Dread

Ashigaru4ss

Ashigaru4ss

Crooked Man4ss

Crooked Man4ss

Crooked Man4ss

Rotten Belles4ss

Rotten Belles4ss

8 models

[Seb3110]

Im sitting in somewhat of the same situation atm. IM trying to plan out my next expansion for Seamus, and have been thinking some lists up Hope it might help you in your seach. I have gone a different way than you, so feel freee to use it or throw it in the trash. All lists are based around VOn Schill as Henchman in the crew:

Liste 1

Seamus

-avatar

Rotten belle

Rotten belle

Rotten belle

Crooked man

Crooked man

Von Schill

Cache = 5. Good map control, and decent shooting from Seamus and Von Schill, along with a good amount of models.

Liste 2

Seamus

-avatar

Copy Cat killer

Sybelle

Rotten belle

Rotten belle

Rotten belle

Von Schill

Cache = 5. Have been adviced to maybe exchange Sybelle for a gunslinger, but not sure about that. Based about what i can personally put on the table right now

Liste 3

Seamus

-avatar

Grave spirit

Rotten belle

Rotten belle

Crooked man

Crooked man

Von Schill

Cache = 8. Variant of List 1. loose a Belle, but gain grave spirit and an additional +3ss cache.

Liste 4

Seamus

-avatar

Grave spirit

Rotten belle

Crooked man

The Hanged

Von Schill

Cache = 8. Very durable list, but few models. Hanged with Armor 2 is very hard to take down.

My personal favorit is probably list 3, since you get both control, durability and a high ss cache.

Hope it was helpfull of sorts

Seb

[IntereoVivo]

First, thank you all for your advice! Lots of good stuff in here for me to mull over.

Second, I was really hoping to play a game this last weekend so I could try out some of the advice but I wasn't able to fit it in. I'm hoping to get one in some time this week at which point I'll report back.

Third, I've expanded my collection to include the Dead Rider, the Von Shill box and I have some Night Terrors on order. People keep mentioning the Drowned. How do they work?

Also, what about bringing Izamu?

[twenty4seven]

Seamus is good in melee. Not because he'll kill the thing he's attacking but because you can make anything he touches insignificant. The majority of the strategies and schemes in the game require a significant model to complete. So doing something like making your opponent's master insignificant can be game changing. After you drop in and make your opponent's key piece insignificant then just lure Seamus out of the combat.

Also, do not forget Seamus' passive abilities. Remember that belles get +2 to their WK when within 8" of Seamus (also remember that dead doxies, sybelle, and molly all have that Belle characteristic). Healing 2 wounds and drawing a card when a living/undead model dies within 6" is also a big deal. If your opponent has whittled a belle down to her final remaining wounds, kill it, and help yourself to a corpse counter, 2 wounds, and a new card.

One of the biggest criticisms I always hear of resurrectionists is that you don't want things to die because they can't effectively summon them back but that's because people don't play rezzers correctly. When you're playing Seamus you've gotta think like a pimp! Your belles mean nothing, never think twice about putting them in any kind of danger if it inhibits your opponent from doing something they need to do or if it ultimately protects Seamus. Also, you should never worry about them getting hurt.

The biggest mistake I see people making when they're playing rezzers is using their control hand on their minions. Saving all your high cards for Seamus or other key spells (like call belle) can win you games. The Belles are defense 3 so they're going to get hit, but their 8 wounds and hard to wound will normally ensure that it takes a while to actually get them off the board.

Scheme choice is another big one for Seamus. Typically you should be able to handle schemes like Stake a Claim, or Breakthrough with relative ease because you're quick and able to play the attrition game well. But Seamus can handle the more violent schemes just as well as anyone else because he's not restricted to taking only belles, and rezzers have access to some godlike minions for dirt cheap!

Edited November 27, 2012 by twenty4seven

[Zephir]

I like your set of Models. though I agree with some of the others that Crookedmen and Drowned will really help you, the models you have here will be great.

First off I pretty much always attach the Avatar to Seamus. Making him go from Shooter to hitter is a nasty swap, and he is really strong all around once Manifested. And when you decide to take the Avatar you pretty much need a full cache, so set aside 2 stones for the Avatar, and 6 for the cache. (7 is ok, but try not to go lower)

Now the Crew.

First thing I always want is a Hitter. A-Seamus is a monster in Melee but I always try and drop my opponents best hitter before Seamus pops so he has less competition. From your set I would take Either Bette or a Hanged. A Hanged with a Grave Spirit is really tough, so I might try that Combo out. Either way, set out another 9 Stones.

Next is Seamus Gal's I would grab 2 Rotten Belles, they are tough, fast when he's around. And great for board control.

That right there is 25 Stones. Seamus, Avatar, Grave Spirit, Hanged, 2 Belles.

For 30 I would just add in an Onryo. They can help remove peoples WP immunities which is nice with this list and they are decent offensively.

I strongly recomend getting a set of Crooked men for your next purchase. They can fill a lot of roles for ressers. And are criminally cheap.

Outside of that I would look into a new hitter too. My personal favorite is the Dead Rider, but I think Izamu once released will be rather awesome too

So a few other points to make. #1 He does no need Von Schill. No resser master does. They stand alone perfectly.

Seamus pre-manifest is not a melee guy. He's a shooter and has the best gun in the game. Post Manifest he is a Melee master. But isn't a dedicated Melee Guy like Lady J and the Vicks. He has control aspects to go along with his Melee.

Use your Belles to Drag models into Seamus' pistol range and focus shots at them. Being able to cheat in that 7 damage severe is huge.

Edited November 27, 2012 by Zephir

[Darios]

one thing people forget to metion is the following: MOLLY!

Jep you heard right.

I played Seamus quite a lot those past two week... with various Crews... and i found that having molly around makes the whole bunch just outright nasty... interesting thing is: molly does all the buffing and plays slower so in the end it feels like she is the master and seamus works as heavy hitter... belles can get a movement of 8 when they are both aroud (which is just awesome as it halfs your APs needed for positioning) and both can take astonishing amounts of damage if things go your way. Imbue Vigor grants +3 walk to a model for the cost of a medium :masks and that makes a good buff for seamus so he can keep up with the belles and has more AP to Shoot and Slice.

I use lists as the following the most:

1. hitty as hell list

Ressurectionists Crew - 35 - Scrap

Seamus, The Mad-Hatter -- 8 Pool

Copycat Killer [2ss]

Molly Squidpiddge [9ss]

Grave Spirit [1ss]

Bête Noire [9ss]

Rotten Belles [4ss]

Rotten Belles [4ss]

jup, few models but a healthy cache (which you will need with master and henchmen) and seamus + bete are just awful for most opponents... i often use molly to summon extra belles (okay they cost 2 counters but seamus is often just to occupied ^^) or if possible: sybelle (hitter nr. 3)

2. Field control deluxe:

Ressurectionists Crew - 35 - Scrap

Seamus, The Mad-Hatter -- 7 Pool

Copycat Killer [2ss]

Molly Squidpiddge [9ss]

Grave Spirit [1ss]

Crooked Man [4ss]

Hamelin, The Ratcatcher [10ss]

Rotten Belles [4ss]

Again few models but a very very nasty list... Hamelin effectivly makes the board a big deal smaller and with Mollys imbue vigor (did i mention i love that spell?) he is effectivly at movement 7 giving him a 32" threat range in turn one... a high handcard and you have a good chance of killing something big /ugly/important in round 1 (pipers lure is just awfully nasty when targeting low wp minions in the first gameturns). Molly can copy the spell with whispered secret and via the grave spirit you can cast the damn thing up to 5 times per turn Oo. And what remains gets shot to shreds by Seamus himself...

Belle and crooked make a tag team and scare things away from bottlenecks and markers (via shaft and lure)

i played this list today against a TT Lynch crew.. in turn 2 i had killed Graves an illuminated and a desp merc with brilliance without having taken a single wound and only activating 4 of my models... my opponent was really annoied at that and well let's just say the game didn't change much from that point on.

3. Tanky babe!

Ressurectionists Crew - 35 - Scrap

Seamus, The Mad-Hatter -- 8 Pool

Copycat Killer [2ss]

Molly Squidpiddge [9ss]

Grave Spirit [1ss]

Rotten Belles [4ss]

Rotten Belles [4ss]

The Hanged [8ss]

well should speak for itself... these models can take a ton of punishment and still keep going... perfect for defennsive play and to counter opponnent strategies like slaughter etc.

Edited November 28, 2012 by Darios
typos...

[Fetid Strumpet]

I find it interesting the different opinions on certain models. I used Molly and Seamus extensively for a year and I feel Molly and the CCK are not in anyway competitive against any player playing a worthy tourney list.

I'd recommend therefore you proxy the models and see if you like them and if they work in your meta. Molly is my favorite character in the game and I desperately tried to get he to work, but she really either needs the suits taken off her spells, or an extra action to be worth her cost.

[IntereoVivo]

*w00t* for more advice! You are all awesome

My environment is just getting started but once rolling it will be filled with what I'll call GenCon Hopefuls. So either I learn to bring my A game or I continue my excellent streak.

Work is killing me this week but I'm going to try to use some of the advice given this weekend after which I will report back.

I'm also going to start condensing some of the advice given into the OP so other new players can see it easily.

[Pierowmaniac]

I find it interesting the different opinions on certain models. I used Molly and Seamus extensively for a year and I feel Molly and the CCK are not in anyway competitive against any player playing a worthy tourney list.

I'd recommend therefore you proxy the models and see if you like them and if they work in your meta. Molly is my favorite character in the game and I desperately tried to get he to work, but she really either needs the suits taken off her spells, or an extra action to be worth her cost.

Disagree that Molly isn't tournament worthy in a Seamus crew (CCK is another matter )

Debuffing with terrible secrets is a death sentence to anything in Seamus (or Lure) range.

Molly as a leader now thats another matter....but I'm nearly there with her LOL (46th out of 54 in the GT)

[Fetid Strumpet]

Disagree that she is a competitive choice, Terrible Secret often makes it easier to hit, but Molly in a Seamus crew, just from expenditure of how much it costs, means you aren't going to have as many models to take advantage of the debuff it provides. Which additionally means getting the activations to line up the way you want to take maximum advantage of even who you want to target it on is difficult.

Also it ceases to be a death sentence if the model target gets into melee, as Seamus' crew doesn't have very good dmg potential in general, which means you aren't going to be landing model killing blows all that often. Additionally Seamus' gun ceases to be much of a threat once models are engaged, because with one shot allowed you very well might waste it by hitting one of your own models. In my experience Terrible secret, while good, it really in general doesn't allow an increase in dmg, it generally only makes it easier to hit. Often you still end up at the negative twist for dmg because you didn't get a high enough total above the Df.

The final nail in the coffin, from my perspective, was the clarification on what Attack Flip vs attack flip was. This basically meant that anything spell related you wish to do dmg with can't benefit from the debuff, and if you were playing against, say, Rasputina, you couldn't use terrible secret to lock down their ability to do dmg.

Your experiences certainly might vary, but I have about 9 months to a year of playing basically nothing but Seamus and Molly, and I almost never felt the stones invested in her were worth her cost.

Best advice, proxy her and try her for a few games and see how she works for you. I will say however that if competitive and effective lists aren't your primary concern then don't even wait to finish this post. Go buy her now. Yo can't get more fluffy then a Seamus/ Molly List.

[IntereoVivo]

Last night I managed to get in a game of Speed Malifaux (30SS) against a aRamos crew.

I ran:

Seamus + Avatar

Grave Spirit

Dead Rider

Onryo

Rotten Belle

Rotten Belle

(6SS)

Strategy: Escape and Survive

Schemes: Bodyguard (Seamus), Grudge (Joss)

He ran:

Ramos + Avatar

Mobile Toolkit

Rusty Alyce

Joss

Metal Gamin

(7SS)

Strategy: Distract?

Schemes:Do I have to do everything myself? (Ramos), Extermination (Undead)

I lost the game handily. We called it at turn 4 because we had a Shadowrun game to start but he had 6 points and I had 0. I was down to aSeamus vs Joss, aRamos, Metal Gamin and a big spider. I'm confident I could have killed Joss the next turn and put some wounds on aRamos but then probably would have died to aRamos as he had 3SS to my 1.

I enjoyed the game immensely even though I made a couple major errors. I traded my Dead Rider + Grave Spirit for Rusty Alyce on turn 2 (in retrospect I should have killed Joss for the points). I positioned my Onryo and Belles too far forward and ended up in Joss' charge range turn 3. I didn't make good use of aSeamus the turn he came in.

On the plus side I did use Seamus better (i.e. not running him out and getting him killed) and I really like the threat range of the Dead Rider. The Onryo has potential but I'm not 100% sold on it.

Any thoughts on the Strategy/Schemes and my list?

[brdparker]

one thing people forget to metion is the following: MOLLY!

2. Field control deluxe:

Ressurectionists Crew - 35 - Scrap

Seamus, The Mad-Hatter -- 7 Pool

Copycat Killer [2ss]

Molly Squidpiddge [9ss]

Grave Spirit [1ss]

Crooked Man [4ss]

Hamelin, The Ratcatcher [10ss]

Rotten Belles [4ss]

Again few models but a very very nasty list... Hamelin effectivly makes the board a big deal smaller and with Mollys imbue vigor (did i mention i love that spell?) he is effectivly at movement 7 giving him a 32" threat range in turn one... a high handcard and you have a good chance of killing something big /ugly/important in round 1 (pipers lure is just awfully nasty when targeting low wp minions in the first gameturns). Molly can copy the spell with whispered secret and via the grave spirit you can cast the damn thing up to 5 times per turn Oo. And what remains gets shot to shreds by Seamus himself...

Belle and crooked make a tag team and scare things away from bottlenecks and markers (via shaft and lure)

i played this list today against a TT Lynch crew.. in turn 2 i had killed Graves an illuminated and a desp merc with brilliance without having taken a single wound and only activating 4 of my models... my opponent was really annoied at that and well let's just say the game didn't change much from that point on.

That sounds like so much fun, I had never thought of that. I've always thought little Hammy was extremely powerful in any crew, and that's another nasty trick I can do (though not against people I want to remain friends with ). For the record, even in a tournament setting when I field Hamelin the Vanilla, I point out and make sure that my opponent fully understands what Piper's Lure does. Even so, the power of it usually takes a demonstration or 3 to get through to them

[Darios]

well in this caase as described it took 2 turns and my opponent was like: "how did you just manage to do that?" and because of this i cannnot belive Molly can't be viewed as competitive... she has some suitheavy spells but actually she'S the only one you really need to have suits in that crew, so why not reserve it for her? and her Strenghts lie more in the copy /totem /magical Extension Synergie and the movement buff than anything else.

The above list is just a very nasty example of what one can come up with... because it nets you effectivly 2 Pipers lure with use Soulstone... thus making it nigh impossible to resist for most non master models... and even them might get twitchy about it.

Edited November 29, 2012 by Darios

[IntereoVivo]

This week I hope to play one of the guys who started about the time I did. He plays Guild and will most likely be playing Perdita and most of the other Ortegas. I know he has the Granny and an Executioner that he likes adding to the family.

Any tips for surviving?

[Zephir]

Engage Nino and Santiago. Use any speed you have to get those two in Melee. They dont have Gunfighter. They are also the top targets for you to kill. Once they are dead the crew loses quite a bit of hitting power.

[Kadeton]

Oof, I wouldn't be rushing into melee with Nino if I were you. The Executioner will tear your speedy models apart before the rest of your crew can support them.

Perdita is a problem for Seamus due to Immune to Influence (Stubborn on the others) and high Df - the thing she's actually most vulnerable to is Terrifying. Putting up Trail of Fear and The Face of Death makes it genuinely annoying for her and her crew to activate, forcing them to often burn high control cards and Soulstones, or fail and run away. It can be really disruptive, but it also leaves Seamus very vulnerable since he hates being in melee range, so it's best left until the later turns when their melee elements are closing on you (unless you have his Avatar attached, then go nuts).

The high Wp across the board makes it hard to Lure the Ortegas out of position - except Papa Loco, who you really don't want anywhere near you. (Luring Papa away from your main force and killing him is good if you can do it, though.) Other than Perdita, they have fairly low Df, so if you can drag them into range it's fairly easy for Seamus to hurt them very badly with a Focused shot.

Night Terrors are going to be your best friend in this match-up - not only will they do the heavy lifting in your objective grabs, they have an aura that debuffs shooting range in a big area (and Wp, with the trigger) - it's up to you whether you swarm at the enemy and force them to deal with the Night Terrors to protect the rest of your crew's advance, or try to keep them alive (and capping objectives) until you can engage, then add their Wp debuff to Seamus' to make those Terrifying checks damn near impossible.

The other important thing you'll have to deal with is the Executioner - he can be completely shut down by Seamus' Undead Psychosis, and he doesn't even get the benefits from Fear Not Death to resist it. Unfortunately Perdita can also remove it, so be wary of that. He's a marginally easier target to Lure than the Ortegas, but if you can't land Undead Psychosis on him (and make it stick) then it's generally a bad idea to bring him near your crew. (Sybelle can also shut him down with Rough Trade, but it's less reliable due to needing the extra Crow.) Basically, time it right and he's a pushover, screw it up and he'll put you in a world of hurt. He's also immune to Terrifying, which is always nice for Seamus.

Anyway, I wouldn't focus your efforts too much on winning at this stage - think of the games as a learning experience (about your own and particularly the enemy's crew). Understand yourself and the enemy first, and your own strategies will become apparent. Most of all, remember to have fun.