Mei Feng Crew

[Miasma]

Hi All

I started by learning the game with Jakob Lynch and quickly discovered that it was Mei Feng that is my Master of Choice and that I much prefer the Arcanist Minions compared to the Ten Thunders (not that 10T are bad, I just prefer the Arcanists)

Now typically I play 30SS Games with the set crew (I'm wanting to test out the Miners with Johan) is this

Mei - Cache 8

Emberling - 2ss

Rail Worker - 5ss

Rail Worker - 5ss

Johan - 6ss

Union Miner - 4ss

Union Miner - 4ss

I also have Rail Golem, Kang, Rail Worker, and another Union Miner (that I cannot use with Mei as Master)

It does well in most situations and for most strategies, I spread out the Miners and look to get them and Johan into choke points on the board before Filing False Claim and utilising an Alpha Strike next turn (with the 2-3 companioned) if I can't kill it with Johan then I can typically pin in place with the Miners Menace (Great for denying Objectives). Mei and the Rail Workers hand out burning tokens and aim to complete her own personal objective.

What else would you suggest that I look into, I have tried Willie, the Demolitionist and find that although he is fun, he does not really make me consider taking him all that heavily (I'd rather take Johan or Kang) and really only want a single Metal Gamin (so not willing to buy the box of 3) so at the moment without purchasing a single card (as the £ for P&P is too high) not going to happen.

I'm leaning towards the SPA(Swarm) and the Steamborg at the moment so will probably be looking at picking up the Ramos Boxset for potential Brawl synergy. Also really like the idea of running Mei (and Emberling) along with Kaeris box (minus a Gunsmith) to spread out the Burning Tokens and still be able to keep Mei Railwalking with the Gamin.

Anything else that I can look at?

Many Thanks

Miasma

[CannonFodder]

You covered most of the basics already, the only thing that you haven't mentioned is the mechanical rider. The extra speed give's you options for mei feng rail walk.

[Clevelander]

Hello,

This is a rather common query. I like that you've got a M&SU theme going, so we'll stay close to that. If you do a little searching, you can read threads where others have started similar crews.

Here is a short list of my opinion of models worth picking up soon:

Kaeris

Metal Gamin

Gunsmith

LSPA(popular with others, but I own none)

Mechanical Rider

Student of Conflict

Really with the addition of kaeris and a gunsmith, you will have plenty of models to run with a kaeris led crew. Do not rely on fire gamin as railwalker nodes. The fire gamin's purpose is to die. Metal gamin, on the other hand, are awesome as railwalker points and provide a lot of survival tricks. LSPA are great with Mei(I've read many times), and they will also pair well with ramos and aRamos if you decide to try them out. The mechanical rider is a fast utility piece that doubles as a hopping point. The student turns henchman kaeris into a raging inferno of doom.

[Miasma]

Thank you for your fast responses, greatly appreciated.

Clevelander, that kind of scuppers my plans slightly I might have to put the Kaeris box on hold for a little while and explore some of the other options listed.

@ Both, The Mechanical Rider was something that I over looked completely so will definitely investigate it a little further. The low defence on the model concerns me slightly however. I guess that it will be a good piece for me to learn to utilise now that I seem to have finally got my head around Mei's trigger train.

With the Student of Conflict, what would benefit the most from fast in the models that I listed in my OP? Or was it really something that you would consider with Kaeris as henchman as oppposed to a replacement to the Emberling?

[Clevelander]

The student is a decent option for a second totem when there is a henchman present. If you run Mei + Kaeris, take emberling first and consider adding the student. The nice thing is that the student can give fast to anyone, so mei and kaeris can take turns getting +1 AP.

The biggest benefit with the extra AP is that kaeris can fly into range, shoot, cast immolate, and fly back to safety. Her immolate can only target models that are already on fire, and her gun sets things on fire. Since Mei''s fists also set things on fire, there may be less of a use for the student in a Mei crew than in other crews. Kaeris+student are very potent in a Marcus list, or perhaps Marcus is potent in a Kaeris+student list.

Edited March 21, 2013 by Clevelander

[Ryu]

One word: Kang.

Kang + Johan has to be one of the sickest combos in existence. With it Johan can get Cb 8 on his hammer and Cb 7 on his gun. Nothing in the game can beat Cb 8 naturally (best is a tie). He also gets Cb 7 on his range 10 gun, which is often overlooked.

Nothing will survive a Cb 8 3/4/6 Flurry without Using Soulstones or getting incredibly lucky on flips/cheats.

Edit: About the student, he would definitely have use if you can make room for him. Mei + Kaeris and Student I'd have the Student fast Mei. She can already semi-consistently take 5 (1) actions a turn with 2 General AP and 1 casting expert, with 3 she will be getting 6 (1) actions a turn quite frequently.

Edited March 21, 2013 by Ryu

[Miasma]

One word: Kang.

Kang + Johan has to be one of the sickest combos in existence. With it Johan can get Cb 8 on his hammer and Cb 7 on his gun. Nothing in the game can beat Cb 8 naturally (best is a tie). He also gets Cb 7 on his range 10 gun, which is often overlooked.

Nothing will survive a Cb 8 3/4/6 Flurry without Using Soulstones or getting incredibly lucky on flips/cheats.

I'm looking forwards to trying that combination at 35SS once the slow grow has escalated that far, at the moment I find it hard to justify over half my selection to those two models (seeing that I cannot see a valid reason to drop the Emberling) at this point level, although I do tend to see Neverborn players running the twins a lot. I'll try it out and see how it goes, I tried just the boxset originally with Kang using Emberling and Mei to provide speed (seismic punch) and protection (vent steam) it just seems that he needs lots of help or else I lost him early even with his regeneration abilities.

Edit: About the student, he would definitely have use if you can make room for him. Mei + Kaeris and Student I'd have the Student fast Mei. She can already semi-consistently take 5 (1) actions a turn with 2 General AP and 1 casting expert, with 3 she will be getting 6 (1) actions a turn quite frequently.

Well seeing as how at the moment I am holding up the slow grow league it's looking likely that I'll be receiving either the Student or a Miss Demeanour as a consolation prize (as the guy who was actually last quit) so either way I'll have another option at the end of next month, I just wont be able to make up the points unless I purchase and paint another box set and use Hobby Points to leap frog my way up the league standings

[Adran]

The last word in fast constructs is the corephyee duet.

Its not cheap (in soulstone terms) and you'll either need to play with sculpting options, or buying 2 blisters as you will want to form the duet, but it moves about the board with no problem. Its pretty survivable but does have the down side that you generally don't want to leave it in combat.

The use of Fire Gamin as rail points has potential. If they are in place you can use them to rail walk, and if your opponent kills them they get set on fire. Its a win win really.

I've yet to try that though so its just a theory.

Kang seems to be a bit Marmite around here. Some people adore him and his potential, others (myself included) just haven't been able to get him to reach that potential. Personally I mentally place him in a similar slot to Samual Hopkins. When he works, it'll be great, but once you've done it once his head gains a bullseye which he just can't survive.

[Miasma]

To be honest with those that I face on a regular basis unless I announce frame for murder on him then Kang goes down fast, really anything that costs above 6ss seems to have a bullseye with neon signs pointed to it.

I've not yet completely given up hope on using the Fire Gamin as railwalk points, hopefully this weekend i'll be able to test the idea by either proxy or a model loan (Rail Golem being loaned to Ramos player)

[CannonFodder]

To be honest with those that I face on a regular basis unless I announce frame for murder on him then Kang goes down fast, really anything that costs above 6ss seems to have a bullseye with neon signs pointed to it.

I've not yet completely given up hope on using the Fire Gamin as railwalk points, hopefully this weekend i'll be able to test the idea by either proxy or a model loan (Rail Golem being loaned to Ramos player)

I gave up on Fire gamin a long time ago, Their job is to run up and die spreading as much fire tokens as possible, then have have Kaeris do her thing. But they are too easily killed, and easy to break the combo.

I would look at the Steampunk Arachnid which is cheaper, The (0) that reduces the defense is nice and I find they live longer due to the their higher defense. I also like the idea of the Latching on Homing beacon fro Mei to use. Also I don't feel like I'm wasting points if I hid one of these behind terrain to have a safety point for Mei to jump to. I just wish it had 5 wlk instead of 4, the arachnid ability helps with terrain issues.

this is my default crew for her

Arcanists Crew - 35 - Scrap

Mei Feng

--

7 Pool

Emberling [2ss]

• Large Steampunk Arachnid
  [5ss]
  
  
• Large Steampunk Arachnid
  [5ss]
  
  
• Mechanical Rider
  [8ss]
  
  
• Rail Worker
  [5ss]
  
  
• Rail Worker
  [5ss]
  
  
• Steampunk Arachnid
  [3ss]
  
  

Edited March 22, 2013 by CannonFodder

[sssk]

To be honest with those that I face on a regular basis unless I announce frame for murder on him then Kang goes down fast, really anything that costs above 6ss seems to have a bullseye with neon signs pointed to it.

The problem which a lot of people seem to face with Kang, is that they charge him right into the heart of the enemy crew and expect him to "Happy Gilmore" his way out the other side. This simply isn't how Kang works. If he takes a few hits in any given turn, he will most likely laugh them off, but if he can be targetted by a lot of attacks in one turn (enough to get roughly 4 HITS on him) then he will die a horrible death.

In my experience, Kang is brilliant at 3 things:

1) Killing a single relatively elite enemy model (we're usually talking 5-8 soulstones depending on the faction, but that's just a rule of thumb)

2) Holding up a mass of enemies with low cb (Ram trigger can get you a few extra attacks which may well one shot these rubbish cheap enemies, don't forget Kang can use defensive stance, so your chance of getting a reasonable ram is not bad, and even if you get that trigger just once, it cancels out the attack which you would have made with the 1 action)

3) Holding an objective (Kang is a scary prospect for most models to tackle, and with his knock back trigger, people often struggle to quickly get an objective)

I haven't tried him with anyone other than Mei yet. I fear he may be a little too slow with anyone else (seismic punch for the win), but I certainly like him. Usually in my Mei lists I find space for either Kang or Kaeris, depending on the strategy etc. I've not tried the Rail golem or mechanical rider yet, purely because I don't have the models, but they seem like a good alternatives.

On the subject of fire gamin, I might occasionally take 1, if I'm not playing slaughter/beatdown to hand out burning tokens and blow up, but usually I can find better things to spend those points on (small arachnid and a soulstone, railworker and one less soulstone, or half a Kang for instance).

I really like small arachnids with Mei. High defense, manouverability, and many activations, means a single swarm can be very useful to put Mei where (and when) you want her.

As a final point, Mei + 1 metal gamin = hilarious/awesome. They have such good synergy. Companion activate, Mei goes punch crazy handing out burning tokens, with her armour 2 on. Gamin then (0) action charges in, takes off the burning tokens and deals damage, then goes protective. Next turn Mei is still there (unless a particularly killy crew has spent all of their activations to beat up the pair) and goes punch crazy again.

[dgraz]

I haven't tried him with anyone other than Mei yet. I fear he may be a little too slow with anyone else (seismic punch for the win), but I certainly like him.

He's awesome as 10T since you can Tora-swap him......I take him with Misaki a lot.

[CannonFodder]

Another option is to use Colette and disappearing act him (with mask trigger to save SS). I've done this with Johan a lot, usually dropping him 2.5 inches from a juicy target, hoping for first activation and flurry the target. if you lose INI, this lets you stop him form disengaging, but also are far enough away to make him use an AP to get close enough to attack since most other targets don't have 3 inch melee.

I'm thinking Kang is a good choice with Colette because if he get hit and look like he may die, you can easily pull him out with disappearing act, and he can be placed back right in the thick of it right away with his self healing.

[Odin1981]

Two mei arcanist builds I have been running under new gaining grounds:

Mei, emberling, oiran (lure is honestly in my opinion one of the top 3 spells in the game), metal gamin, kaeris, student, rail golem 7ss.

Mei, ember, rail golem, mech rider (rail golem+mech rider much better than kang johan combo except for hitting high def models), metal gamin, desperate merc , oiran, small spider 6ss.

2nd list is more rail walker heavy but is more the mei is a obj grabber type one. 1st list is she+kaeris alternate fast every turn (only 2 railwalk points), mei uses iron skin from trigger on herself but base (0) iron skin on usually mech rider. Mech rider + rail golem do the lifting of the list. I like this for kill strats (new claim jump, beatdown). First list for treasure hunt. I run colette for line in the sand (who wouldn't if you own them). I will probably run the showgirls for treasure as well but at the moment I am trying to get reps in with mei atm so she gets treasure duties.

Edited March 22, 2013 by Odin1981