Auto Include Models

[MasterDisaster]

Your opponent obviously never plays shooty Ramos...Ramos doesn't randomize for his lightning bolt either, and with the spiders reducing Df, that can be quite devestating.

Steam Arachnids would be a must take for Ramos, but he summons them, so I rarely hire more than one of them with him.

You are pretty much bang on the mark, my opponent only hired one arachnid who was swiftly dispatched by Joss to summon a load more. He kept Swarming them up though, at the end of the game I told him he should have not left Ramos so exposed to my Oiran's lures and shouldn't have swarmed up so many Arachnids either. He has only had about 3-4 games with Ramos though so he was trying out some new things to see what he could do with the crew. Unfortunately this didn't work out so well for Ramos.

[Dracomax]

Yeah, swarming is one of those things that should be done far more rarely. the individual spiders are just too good. But Ramos can only make spiders once per turn, so he should be spending the rest of the turn doing things with Ramos.

[MasterDisaster]

But Ramos can only make spiders once per turn, so he should be spending the rest of the turn doing things with Ramos.

Well that is interesting. Not being a Ramos player I assumed the ability to create Arachnids was a (1) action that could be spammed (this is how my opponent was doing it anyways). But if it's once per turn I'll have to slap him upside the head and demand a rematch so I can beat him even harder the next time round!

[Dracomax]

protip: always look over your opponent's cards. Also, make sure he is adding the Wounds to the spiders he summons. it usually doesn't make much difference, but you shouldn't ignore it.

That said, it is possible to create a situation in which Ramos summons 3 Spiders and an electrical construct each round, gives them a positive flip to defense, and then shoots at an enemy or heals his own models. And he can get models which can summon more spiders.

[Sybaris]

For competitive games, I'd probably guess that Austringers will show in a good majority of guild crews.

[Matney X]

Joss, for Railwalk-focused Arcanist Mei Feng lists.

[RagingRodian]

I agree about Francois, but the other two, though really nice, can be omitted IMO.

I often find that Francois ends up going out in a blaze of glory, but Raphael is the one that is grabbing me VPs. Lenny is the one that is often situational for me, unfortunately he is very vulnerable to WP attacks that don't give conditions.

Is it acceptable to always include Francois and Raphael simply because I like how their models look?

Edited January 30, 2014 by RagingRodian

[MasterDisaster]

Is it acceptable to always include Francois and Raphael simply because I like how their models look?

Of course! Many consider Shang to be a steaming pile of horse manure however I like his model and get good use out of him. I almost always bring him along when I'm playing Misaki purely for Rush of Magic, the Heal and an extra activation. at 3ss I consider him a steal. That's not most peoples view on him though. I also always take the Nothing Beast with Tara purely because I love the model, most consider Killjoy or a Desolation Engine to be superior, I've yet to try Killjoy as a friend wanted to paint it for me and he's taking forever but even so I'll probably still take the Nothing Beast a lot because his model is cool.

The great thing about this game is that auto-include comes down to personal preference rather than how badass the model is. I have a friend who ALWAYS takes Papa Loco with Perdita purely because he likes the fluff. He always dies and rarely gets masses done but my friend loves "Senior Crazy Pants" so he's an Auto-Include for him.

Edited January 30, 2014 by MasterDisaster