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PW Demos Help


Clousseau

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Tips for teaching PW:

After a fluffy intro, start with a rough intro of the components in this order: cards - board - tokens - models - stat cards. People are familiar with cards so they're not hard to grasp, the board itself is simple to describe while with the stat card you just point out the two different sides.

Have 3 models per side and have them roughly 5 spaces apart from the opponent (maybe with an impassable token in the middle). Best puppets to use is probably two Death Marshals and a Razorspine Rattler versus two Rotten Belles and a Silurid (mention the Masters negating suits, but don't include them in the game).

Then go through an animation each; you first, then them (even though you'd normally play you're animation cards at the same time). Highlight the animation cost, then perform a move and if you can an action. Then let them have a try (if they have the Death Marshals you can set it up so in their turn they can attack at Range 2). Have at least one combat and highlight the ability to replace numerical values and stack suits by playing cards from your hand. Then that should be enough. No need to do anything with workbenches or upgrades as that just complicates things. Mention afterwards that puppets animate first from a WB, and that when a Puppet dies you can access their upgrade. So long as you remember the changes to the game (no blocking rule, place card in hand then choose animation card, etc) then just covering the basics should be enough to introduce someone to the game (the models should do the rest).

The key things to highlight (i.e. the selling points of Puppet Wars) are:

  1. Free force construction - 44 models in the box and you can take just about any combination.
  2. Upgrades - Losing models doesn't necessarily mean losing the game; use your losses to bolster your remaining puppets.
  3. Brutal strategy - the game is brutal and fun, and doesn't take too long to play, but with all the different toybox load outs and card management, there's also a lot of tactical depth to it (depending on who you're talking to would influence which side you emphasise).

The list of Puppets in the starter is as follows:

  • Masters - Lady Justice, Seamus and Pokey Viktoria
  • Sidekicks - Judge, Bête Noire, Rusty Alyce, Misaki and Hooded Rider
  • Pawns (x3) - Death Marshal, Executioner, Guild Austringer, Rotten Belle, Nurse, Punk Zombie, December Acolyte, Razorspine Rattler, Silurid, Malifaux Cherub, Ronin and Convict Gunslinger.

Hope that helps. I don't really do demos so I've not put these ideas into practice, but others have went with a similar format so I think it works.

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I agree with thepandadirector, though I think if you're showing people who know Malifaux, you could fairly easily start off with a master and a few puppets.

When I've demoed (old rules) in the past, I found working through the "demo rules" (which were 5 scenarios in the rule book, working up from basic movement/attacking through to the full game) often got quite stale quickly.

It's not too difficult to pick up, so playing a small game with pretty much the whole rules (maybe first game you might ignore the upgrades side of things) will have people slightly confused for the first turn (5 activations), but after that people catch on pretty quickly.

Also for simplicity in everything being similar, I might suggest that you use seamus and lady j as your demo masters, just because they ignore their respective suits in activation requirements, whereas pokey vik works slightly differently (as outcasts don't have a suit), so seamus and lady j will just be that little bit more logical (as well as a fluffy narrative to the game).

Generally in terms of crews, I'd suggest (as panda did) using 2 or 3 puppets of your master's suit and 1 or 2 not from it. Maybe Lady J, death marshall, executioner (maybe austringer too), Silurid (maybe december acolyte too), and Seamus, rotten belle, punk zombie (maybe nurse too), razorspine rattler (maybe malifaux cherub too). Just for variety in activations. with 3 of each puppet, you could even have lady j with a belle and seamus with a death marshall or something, just to show that anyone can take anything.

Anyway, that's just offering up some other suggestions. Give it a go with Panda's suggestions, and then if anything needs altering, maybe try some of these.

Good luck

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