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Students of Conflict - Season 2 - #3B - San Antonio July Tournament: Cameron (Misaki Katanaka vs Molly Squidpiddge)
359 Plays5 months ago
This episode we welcome Cameron to the podcast for the first time to talk to him about a game in his trip to the podium. We discuss the importance of target priority and knowing which actions will score you the points to win you the game.
Hosts: Clay and Doug
Guests: Cameron and Christian
Tournament: July Malifaux Monthly Tournament - San Antonio
Tournament on Longshanks: https://www.longshanks.org/event/16939/
Round 3
Deployment and Strategy: Corner, Raid the Vaults
Schemes: Power Ritual, Sweating Bullets, Information Overload, Take Prisoner, Ensnare
Cameron’s Schemes: Sweating Bullets, Information Overload
Jonathan’s Schemes: Power Ritual, Information Overload
Final Score: 4-4
Crews:
Cameron’s Misaki Katanaka
Size: 50 - Pool: 5
Leader:
Misaki Katanaka
Totem(s):
Shang
Hires:
Minako Rei
Ototo
Banying
Fuhatsu
Terracotta Warrior
Jin Baccara
Johnathan’s Molly Squidpiddge
Size: 50 - Pool: 9
Leader:
Molly Squidpiddge
Totem(s):
Necrotic Machine
Hires:
Crooligan
Crooligan 2
The Forgotten Marshal
Philip and the Nanny
Archie
Carrion Effigy
Dapperling
Recipes Discussed:
Cameron's Sourdough chocolate chip cookies
Also Mentioned in the Podcast:
The Lonestar Fauxdown Malifaux GT: https://lonestarfauxdown.com/events
Thank-Yous:
HUGE thanks to Dragon’s Lair Comics & Fantasy at the San Antonio Medical Center, for supporting this month’s tournament … especially given the extremely short notice!
Also, big thanks to Top Doug Design for all the terrain we play on here in Texas and for sponsoring this podcast, to Wyrd Miniatures for allowing us to use their artwork from the 2nd Edition Student of Conflict, and to Dragon’s Lair Comics & Fantasy North Houston, the normal home of our Texas tournaments.
Dragon’s Lair Comics and Fantasy - San Antonio Medical Center: https://www.dlair.net/medicalcenter/
Top Doug Design: https://www.topdougdesign.com/
Wyrd Miniatures: https://www.wyrd-games.net/malifaux
Dragon’s Lair Comics & Fantasy - Houston North: https://www.dlair.net/houston-north/
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction: Podcast and Malifaux Tournament
00:00:10
Speaker
Straight out of the heart of Texas, here come the students of conflict, helping you become a better Malifaux player and reach the top of the podium, one game at a time.
00:00:33
Speaker
Welcome to Students of Conflict. We are Clay and Doug. Hello! And hello! And we are very happy to have actually had a tournament and therefore a podcast this month, despite the very best efforts of Hurricane. Now we're back in the recording booth. I have electricity! Yep. And we're trying to become better Malifaux players, leveling up ourselves and hopefully helping others level up as well. We do this by taking an in-depth look at one game from our guests.
00:00:58
Speaker
asking about the key decisions that they made before the game, during the game, and now that they're looking back at the game, what were the things that they learned and that they could pass on to others? We interview our guests together so we can get some good cross-flow and different perspectives, but we release them as one individual podcast per guest, helping people level up one game at a time. Today, we are speaking with Christian and Cameron. Hey, how's it going? Hello.
00:01:27
Speaker
Look out. Anyways, these guys came in first and second at the July Malifaux Monthly Tournament. It was held not in Houston, but in San Antonio this month, 14th of July, 2024. We're gonna be releasing our discussions with these guys as seasons two, episodes 3A and 3B.
Cameron's Journey into Malifaux
00:01:46
Speaker
All right, Cameron, first of all, welcome to the podcast. This is your first time on Students of Conflict, so we are super happy to have you here.
00:01:54
Speaker
Yeah, this is awesome. And congratulations on making the podium. Very, very cool. Thank you. So can for our very first guest, we kind of like having just a really quick and obviously it's it's been a long journey for some of us. But like, how on earth did you get into Malifaux? What brought you to this moment of making the podium in a Texas tournament?
00:02:17
Speaker
Well, so I got into miniature gaming way back in like the mid 2000s through Dawn of War and 40k, of course, um went to college 40k kind of got expensive.
00:02:29
Speaker
because as you know as it does heck yeah but swap to war machine played war machine for a bit swap to infinity play infinity bit um and then we move back into austin i met um i want to say his name was robert stool the uh hench i think the old henchman in the area before he moved out and he almost got me to gg2 um i'm trying to remember what actually got me the gg3 and i think it was just a tuesday night i was at our store games castle um And I picked up a cold boxes because Malifaux is probably the best looking miniatures game
00:03:05
Speaker
like gw has some cool big big old stupid monster models you know um but malifo i don't know every crew in part it's because of the crew system every crew has so much flavor to it they're just eye-catching and i think that's what got it in was i saw i believe it was the masaki box i was like all right that's a pretty kick-ass crew there i'm gonna pick this up and then do people play this locally Oh, they do. All right, I'm gonna head out. And that's how I got kind of met Andre, Jordan, Trey and John, because they were the one they were the main crew up in Austin. Yeah, up in Austin, where you're from. Yeah, no, that's awesome. And then and then the rest is history. That's super cool. Thank you. Thanks for sharing that.
Road Trip Tales and Snack Preferences
00:03:43
Speaker
um want to do. And then we always have an official icebreaker question. We've been making them all food related ah now as we as we kind of lean into this better Malifaux one snack at a time sort of thing. And so um that you are always making road trips. We've had like maybe two tournaments up in Austin. Normally you're on the road to Houston. um This time you made it down to San Antonio and we're super glad you did. But what is your favorite Texas road trip snack? Our listeners need to know.
00:04:14
Speaker
if i'm going If I'm going sweet, it's kind of a toss up between cherry sours and black licorice. It's hard to find good black licorice. A lot of black licorice is kind of garbage. Another black licorice lover! And you know what? I don't brick-rich anyone who doesn't like black licorice.
00:04:31
Speaker
You know, every time I get like I asked, you know, buy a car, you want some? No. OK. And then that's it. It's all mine. i'll I'll pray for your body after you eat it, bro. I got you. You got ah you got a limit. You got a lot of that's a lot of salt. Yeah. Oh, boy. And, you know, I'm already a ah salty person, friendly salt, but who boy?
00:04:53
Speaker
um And then cherry sours, like I said. But I actually prefer jerky, just because it's not a whole bunch of sugar, because I'm already probably hopped up on caffeine. and So a little less sugar is helpful for me not to crash and drive through the median ah driving back home, which I have done. Ouch. Well, we're glad you made it. like Not any time recently, thankfully. Yep.
00:05:18
Speaker
And in context on that thing, I actually did fall asleep, doze off, driving back from, I want to say, ah Amarillo for a big infinity tournament. ah So I pulled over and bought about three monsters, and I started chugging those on the way back, and then it was fine. Oh, That's wild. But yeah. Yeah. I was like, all right, cool. I rationed them. I didn't just chug all three, but I was, I was, I chugged one, and then I rationed the rest of them out. That's when our drive sucks. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure. that And then you're like,
00:05:48
Speaker
gigging out. Oh, boy. Oh, yeah, it was desperately finding podcasts to listen to to keep me keep me focused on something. Hey, Cameron, I'm gonna say this. Our trip snacks. You me, buddy. I mean, you said jerky, you said black licorice, you said cherry sours and an uncomfortable amount of caffeine. man Oh, yeah, that describes my road trip to a tea. But yeah, black licorice, cherry sours and any kind of spicy jerky.
00:06:15
Speaker
ah Sounds like a plan, sounds like a plan. Man after my own heart. There you go, it's so awesome.
Match Analysis and Strategy Insights
00:06:22
Speaker
Alrighty, so which round are we talking about and why? We're talking about round three. um Last round I tied against Jonathan's Molly. um a lot you know A lot of times I end up playing Jonathan in round three.
00:06:38
Speaker
ah Run two and three I if I win my first game a lot of times I end up paired against him because he's a excellent player um And usually we end up people end up playing Molly against me and usually he ends up kind of e mopping the floor with me a little bit um So this game was pretty satisfying. I didn't get ah the win. We did tie 4-4 But I'm pretty satisfied with how that game went in terms of overall mostly the scheme blocking and then just kind of target selection was probably my what really cost me the the win there. A couple points where if I did one different thing, I could have swapped that into a 5-4. Jonathan is like the boogeyman of my last year. The whole first year, I got a one win on that dude. He has stiffed me over like 30 something games.
00:07:27
Speaker
It is, he is a really tough opponent. So oh yeah, tough opponent. He's an excellent opponent. He's really very easy, enjoyable to play against for sure. Oh, absolutely. 100%. But uh, Molly is a little bit of a boogeyman for me specifically. Um, disturbing story is a a pain in the butt when I'm playing thunders. Uh, cause I, I don't play card draw crews as it turns out every crew I like just, oh, where's the, there's no card draw. Okay.
00:07:54
Speaker
Yeah, you're going for this. It's like, all right. I got i got six cards and a dream. And a dream. And then I have no cards. And I get to listen to Disturbing Story three times in a row. And well they that's a dead henchman. I got six cards and a dream. So we will get into that. Yeah, yeah for sure. And so, which is awesome. that um And so what were the biggest lessons and just kind of like overall themes from this game?
Lessons from the Tournament
00:08:22
Speaker
Kind of from the entire tournament was I played Masaki once, same crew all all all weekend. Masaki, Shang, Monako, Ototo, Banyang, Fuhatu, Eterikata, and Jin. And a biggest thing was probably target priority. And then if you need something done for a scheme or a strat, who do you have available? They need to go do it. um Because it's a lot of times, learning Malifaux, like, all right, what is Ototo's job? He's a min 3. He needs to go hit something.
00:08:54
Speaker
but he's got a six-inch place. He's got a six-inch range Shadow Marker place with a Master trigger to place himself based based on Shadow Marker. So it's basically a roughly seven-inch place for himself. And he can do that twice in a turn. So he can just rocket up the board way faster than his move five appears. He can get out of combat. He can get where he needs to go. Monaka raise, move six. And a lot of times people don't like to fight Monaka because ah This is pre-reworked Monaco, but you know, she's not that different. Karmic ties can be really nasty if you're going into a henchman. Banying has Ninja Vanish with a not terrible stat, needing a 6 instead of a 7.
00:09:34
Speaker
um Alright, Vuhatu doesn't scheme. you don't teas That's not his job, but the point still stands. If he he needs to stand at a point, he can stand at a point. And then Jhin is probably my favorite model in the keyword right now, just because Oh, that what's that krulligan doing? He's back in your phlegm. So now which graded doesn't matter because by your side is a very very silly ability, but ah Or a turn that krulligan can't do anything and if there's no setup for him to get back there Well, he's he's he's not getting back there Yeah
00:10:09
Speaker
um But and then the other side of that is target priority with the sake right with a toto with ah even ban yang honestly um They're very good at scalping out models. It's very hard without yeah wasting AP to stop Misaki getting where he needs. She needs to go between Ototo throwing out shadow markers, bonding Sunless selves, running around, you know, unstoppably, giving that they're not really there. They're, what is it, where that's the one you know slip by, can't be engaged, can move through enemy models. um It's very hard to stop a shadow marker getting to where Misaki needs to go.
00:10:45
Speaker
um And then that Shadow Marker sets up Banying if he wants to do something. That Shadow Marker sets up Monaka Ray summoning Catashiro's. So the crew is very good at getting to where it needs to go. It's a little squishy, right? Outside of Toto there's no armor. Misaki's a Defense 5 Master, ah Defense 6 Master, which is good, but that's basically all she has outside of extended reach. So the crew is somewhat squishy.
00:11:11
Speaker
But it's super mobile and it's super it's very mobile i say supermo it's very mobile and it's very killy. um so playinggainst say my first round was againstcinnali I can just go kill Nelly. yeah It takes some time. it's You can play the Akiti Sax as she squeals away every single attack.
00:11:29
Speaker
But I can go kill those interact shutdown models, and then I can start playing the schemes in the strats. um In this game against Molly, I can kill Archie, put all my end to killing Archie, because that is a scary model. And after that, outside Molly, she didn't really have any big beaters. You didn't really have any min 3 beaters. In this particular crew. So cool. Yeah.
00:11:52
Speaker
let's ah Let me, so yeah, let me go ahead and talk about, you've you've already run through your crew, that on the other side, Jonathan had, but it was Molly one, Molly squid pitch. um Obviously the totem, couple of crew ligands, of course, um of course, um had forgotten Marshall and he also was running Phillip and the nanny and a dapperling and the carrion effigy.
00:12:19
Speaker
And so all four of those last models, like like you're always going to see, obviously, the totem, but accrual again or two and Archie, of course. But then there is a lot of variability in Molly Crew. Bring in forgotten Marshall, Phillip, and Nanny. Those are not models you see a lot. Kerrigan, effigy without an upgrade, not a model you see a lot. Dapperling I've never seen before. um I can't be sure whether the effigy had The upgrade, actually, let me double check that. I quickly sent this to you. Let me see. I only have to look at the game real quick. So his crew in the app, let me see. um Yeah, no, it was the carrying effigy without the upgrade. Yeah. And so just, just
00:12:59
Speaker
um so just and we may, we're probably going to circle back on the cruise to a little bit, but but yeah, just any thoughts when you when you saw that crew, What were you thinking? um and And did that change your game plan to me? Or you're like, no, I'm just going to be mobile and killy. And I don't really care. it's My thinking was, A, all right, don't take. Well, first, I was thinking, OK, Rezzer. What happened the last time I played Jonathan? I played Mei Feng II. He hired Seamus McMorning. One. All right, cool. ah
00:13:35
Speaker
Banned red shovel because I'm not taking armor, so he's not going to hire me morning. Like I said, this is actually my first games I've played in maybe four to five months. OK, welcome back to. Yeah, I'm glad I'm going to try and get more games in here. But I was trying to remember, all right, are there any real big out of keyword options in razors? I couldn't think of any of something ahead. I just know Seamus is pretty independent of his crew. It's like, all right, let's just ban Seamus. Why not?
00:13:59
Speaker
um And I said, james he last time I played him, he brought Douglas McMorning into Mei Fang 2 and just kind of ate things because ah Precise is a hell of a drug. Yeah, it is. It is. It is. My band was mostly, all right, what I don't want to see a Seamus because damage aid is, I don't want that. um But he didn't take anything out of keyword. Playing through it, most of my thoughts were around, all right, Archie needs to die. And I need to keep cards in my hand for Molly.
00:14:29
Speaker
Now, I thought about that. I didn't actually like follow that that plan. um I, you know, Patricia was talking about ah card, what sort, card discipline, ah playing in shortened. Yeah, I didn't have any card discipline. It's like, I need a sunless cell. I'll discard a card for sunless cells. How many cards? Oh, I have two cards in hand? Uh-oh. Yeah. Yeah. Tarakai, there's no point. The Tarakai gets me one card. I'm still taking three damage because I have arcane ah reservoir. Oops.
00:14:59
Speaker
um But honestly, um the biggest thing was killing Archie was my big thought, because leap, um it's not statted, but henchmen, stones, so easy to get that four of. 3-4-6, I'm sure Ototo can take it, but Monaco, not really. Banyang, not really. right Even Misaki doesn't want to be hit being seen being hit by 3-4-6. So my biggest goal, turn one and two, was killing Archie. And I managed it.
00:15:28
Speaker
um You see, it's a good goal. It's a pretty good goal. Because after that, outside Molly, she doesn't really have a lot of high damage options. And at that point, I can kind of focus on killing certain things and then kind of locking things down. So my second kind of target there was like, all right, Forgotten Marshal can summon. All right, I don't want more Kuraligens. We got to kill the Forgotten Marshal. 100% agree with that, too. And then after that, it was mostly me being reactive.
00:15:57
Speaker
because I was having to you know relearn how my crew works. So I was pretty tight on time. And I actually did clock out round five. I got all my activations in. But at that point, just through sheer volume of kind of whatever attacks into stuff, I just did not have the models left on the board by the end there. um Let me actually look at what was I had left alive. Yeah, last turn, I had Misaki, Fuhatsu, and Jin Bakara on live on the board. um Between Molly.
00:16:24
Speaker
um And ironically enough, Phillip and the Nanny was very killy that game. Paramran is like, oh, it's a 2-3-5. It's a 2-3-5 with a henchman.
00:16:36
Speaker
um And I believe, I want to say he had ah an upgrade on him to get regen. but I mean, I'm just remembering. um But a boring conversation with Phillip and the Nanny. He was able to, in again, Ban Ying is good, but he's not he's not super You know he's not a toad with him in 3. He can't necessarily just kill another henchman no problem. So he filled in and he was basically hitting him in the shins every turn. And eventually he did manage to kill him. And then summoning an extra crew again after he killed Juan. Summoning a rabble rouser to kind of top Uhatzu. Carrying effigy.
00:17:14
Speaker
Existed I literally forgot he had it in the crew until I she looked at the game. I don't think doing anything but maybe walking interact just hanging out Yeah, okay. Yeah, I clearly cannot think of any actions it took um That's hilarious, but the I forgot you know, I lost my train of thought here. What was your question again?
00:17:31
Speaker
so um So I had taken us- Refocus me, refocus me, sir. Yeah, not a problem. so i And I had personally taken us down the tangent of like, let's talk about Cruz for a while, because we were really talking about yours. And so I want to close some parentheses, and I want to go back to kind of like before the tournament even started, um you have have been playing thunders for a while. And like I was expecting you to be playing Mei Feng at your first game back. she She's your comfort pick. You're very good with her.
00:17:59
Speaker
I've seen you kick some serious butt with her.
Choosing Misaki Over Mei Feng
00:18:02
Speaker
No, you haven't made it to the show yet. You have a podium with her. So like, why would you? Why would you change? The problem with Mayfang is that crew is all about scrap and armor. And if someone can ignore your armor and get through your scrap, the crew is kind of squishy as it turns out. It's a little bit like Hoffman.
00:18:23
Speaker
um because it's very mobile, but you gotta get the scrap out first. Compared to Misaki, who makes her own shadow markers and can teleport to them. Okay. ah it's it's ah It's a different flavor of mobility, and additionally, her crew walks for the mobility, so you're using AP to still walk. It's a very long-range walk, but it's still a walk compared to Misaki from shadows to us to ah to a marker. Interact, walk, interact. You can't redo that with Mei Fang. And it it's it's a much...
00:18:56
Speaker
and to put this Mayfing's crew almost feels like you kind of ah have to have a more strict order of operations to set up the scrap machine to start summoning in your game. Because you don't get your gaming out, that really reduces how much scrap you can end up with on the board. And you really need that scrap on the board for walk the rails, um for her ah for sparks' is hazardous aura, for her own damage ignore. um You really need that scrap out early, and you need to keep it out throughout the game. And if you can't set that up turn one, if you order operations as such where, I don't know, you activate her early or you set your crew up poorly,
00:19:31
Speaker
It can really hamper your you're getting out of your points because a lot of her crew is slow. Move four, move five. So without the walk the rails, it's hard to get up the board without just using a peon and walk walking.
00:19:43
Speaker
Yeah, no, totally. um So Misaki's crew, is just it's more independent. The models themselves are more independent. They can function without needing to set things up for them. I guess is the way I think about it. OK. And you were saying that was Misaki was your first kind of the master that got you into Malefoe, your first core box. So my first actual box was the Jacob Lynch second edition box, because hey, good gambling man with a weird technical monster behind him. That's kind of cool. Yeah. Misaki was my first actual master, because hey, ninjas ninjas are cool.
00:20:12
Speaker
Yeah. And then I and of learned I hate most of her keyword. what Except the named keyword. heyword I love all the named characters. I do not like her minions. I never seem to get played, but they look cool.
00:20:27
Speaker
I love her crew's aesthetic. I love the the the triad Yakuza style they got going on. I love the look of Misaki too. I don't want to play her. She doesn't do much. um But I love the whole Yakuza. I love the look of crime bosses. I love Yami's ego being this kind of lieutenant who threatens ah Lucas McCabe and all the lore. um But it's just Torukage needing a seven for the Ninja Vanish is rough.
00:20:54
Speaker
um Crime bosses just kind of die. They're very hit, they hit hard, but they have extended reaches. That's pretty much their only defensive tech they got on them. You can give them hard to kill, but now they're, um I want to say 10 stones for that, at that point, um which is a lot. um I was going to say, though, like if you think about it right now, like I was talking about earlier, is the fact that right now in the game, our biggest thing is the fact that board presidents, having a lot of models, they interact, do a lot of things.
00:21:25
Speaker
And, and it's kind of crazy that you pick Misaki because they're very fine. Like, even though they have kind of Shira, of course, pre-nerve and pre-changes, it's like, they're not very, like, they can only get so many models. They're more about isolating and executing one model at a time per round.
00:21:43
Speaker
They're very precise. Part of how this GG has been going, at least in these three games I've played, is a lot of times my opponents end up spreading way out. um Game one, Deli was on her own on one side, and there's two crews on the other side. Game two, same thing happened. My opponent spread his crew out. Game three, ah there maybe two models on his crew were within within like six inches, eight inches of each other. it was That game ended with all of our crews spread very far.
00:22:10
Speaker
um going very wide, and Misaki's crew is very good at that. Misaki's crew can can spread pretty wide, and because most of my crew is henchmen, Shry only had five stones, but if there was a big hit coming, I had stones to to block it. Henchmen are generally speaking going to be pretty durable. All my, you know, they're all eight health. Decent decent stats, so does Defense Four, but hey, Armor One.
00:22:34
Speaker
um
00:22:36
Speaker
So, And her minions aren't necessarily that much cheaper, like I believe Tora Kage are still seven costs. How do I show costs? There we go. Yeah, Tora Kage are cost six. Snipers, Thunder Archers all cost seven. So her cheapest minion is a cost six Tora Kage.
00:22:59
Speaker
um so So... Yeah. Whereas you're running a lot of cost eight models. And so it's like, if I could, if i can seven eight points for Banying, I'll spend eight points for Banying over six points for a Toracaga. Yeah. He's two more points, but a stat six Ninja Vantage versus the stat seven on the Toracaga. I believe it's still sad. Sorry, not to take over too many questions, but you, you know, did you, did you ever think about running Yamasiko with Yari and, uh, nimble like in this DJ where you need AP efficiency? She has moved four.
00:23:32
Speaker
She is moved four, but you know having access to being able to walk or sorry interact, walk, interact, you only need four inches of space. That is true.
00:23:43
Speaker
um
00:23:46
Speaker
I thought about it, but when I looked through my bag, I was so my setup at my bag, but the game was I pick grabbed one of my bags. And so my crew would have either been cry to the entire time or my Thunder's back. Okay, I gotcha. I liked that and grabbed my Thunder's back, but I didn't have Yamazika with me. And I was already having to borrow Terracotta's and Jhin from Devon 1, the Prime Devon. Gotcha. So I didn't i didn't want to proxy more, because at that point it's it's getting a little no i get i i forget which one is which so but yes um and i believe i cannot think of his name there is a player in houston who does that who runs um asaki one where he takes yami ziko because she can walk and react walk he takes well he takes a lot of things but they all end up interacting a lot throughout the game because everything is a scheme runner i
00:24:34
Speaker
Travis, I think his name is. That sounds like something Travis would do. Yeah. yeah and And that's kind of something i've I've tried to internalize there is, all right, everything is a scheme runner when necessary. um So playing this game is like, all right, i is there anything I can just kill with this? No. All right, cool. She's going to go over here and walk, interact, walk, and ah stuff ballots. She's going to interact twice to stuff with ballots in here.
00:24:57
Speaker
um She's going to walk, she's going to go over here and drop two ski markers for information overload. I just love like, yeah, master API was like, Oh, never walk. And like, you know, you got to have powerful stuff. It's like, yeah, you're scoring points. Like I'm walking over here, I'm dropping two ski markers. Like that's what I just, I'm winning the game. So yeah, master activations are fantastic at winning the game.
00:25:21
Speaker
And even beyond that, with Monaco and with the sheer number of shadow markers, you can just crap out in this crew with Banyang or Toto, Masaki, yourself. um You can set a very easy Catashiro sublet. And this is pre-Wear-It Catashiro, where they had a stat list five-inch place. Yeah. um Now granted, rework Catashiro's are still not terrible. Let me see if I can. Oh, did I not spell that right? They're not as evil as they were before.
00:25:49
Speaker
The difference now is you need a four of masks to get the same effect. It's still a bonus action, so you can still interact. Paper Blizzard for the pop and trigger interact. um But they're not going to suddenly bust out five attacks six attacks on someone and just kill them. Right? So they're they're pure scheming now. And they're base they're they're speed bumps, and they're they're not awful scheme runners for you know ah throwing out, I think, what's the new TN, a nine. She needs a nine at home instead of a 10.
00:26:19
Speaker
So yeah, definitely.
Role of Banying in Misaki's Crew
00:26:22
Speaker
Let me ask about, and so we we talked through this particular master and why you were running her.
00:26:30
Speaker
um This is, we're still relatively early into Ashes of Malifaux models. Certainly they haven't all come out yet. And you have talked a lot about Banying, but like I have never seen Banying on the table yet. Could you kind of talk me just through Banying and what Banying brings to the fight? So defense move Shadow Clone didn't happen, ever. But looking at his card,
00:26:55
Speaker
The biggest thing is Ninja Vanish, honestly, and part was also I just wanted to play Ben Yang. It was like, oh, this is a cool model. Let's play him. um Ninja Vanish on a stat six is very nice, because it's a six-inch teleport to a Shadow Marker. You can get up roughly about seven inches when you place it on the opposite side of the Shadow Marker. Yeah, it's going to be able to leap, basically. Yes. Half past Shadow Marker there, but it's basically... Oh, you're playing a soccer. You're going to have Shadow Markers. Well, exactly, yeah. It's also a friendly Ski Marker, so worst case, I can have something, some walk-up drop of Ski Marker, sure. And then he can also Ninja Vanish to that and turn that into a Shadow Marker.
00:27:30
Speaker
But then, as a muck model, he has chi. So yeah, he's illusion and strike, he's doing stat five. But if you have the chi, he's stat seven. Defense, defense five, whip five, he might be defense seven. um But mostly, what I spent my chi on most of the time was sunless cells. Having an invincible little model that doesn't do anything, sure, it explodes as soon as it activates. But having this little guy run 10 inches up,
00:27:59
Speaker
and just become a shadow marker or to summon it. And now, because it's any shadow marker dropped within six, he can spend a chi or a card to turn into a summoner self. That summoner self does not take damage, does not engage anything. um It's insignificant. It's mindless. So it's summoning without generating resources from my opponent and until the next turn, obviously. um But it extends his threat range.
00:28:23
Speaker
um because there's no range on Illusionary Strike as far as I can tell. It's actually drawn from a friendly shelf on the shelf. um
00:28:33
Speaker
And the next turn, that's a shadow marker that can go wherever I need it to go. And move, slip by and move 10 in 10 inches for two walk actions, it's going to end up, generally speaking, where I need it to go. um So Bonnieing was mostly, honestly, used to set up Misaki and Monaco.
00:28:49
Speaker
um And then he a lot of times would sit in the middle of the board with a couple of sunless elves around him as a little kind of minefield, I guess, is the best way to put it. He kind of sat out there a lot of the time, most of my games. And in game three, he uses sunless elves to set up Masaki to get at the, because this is on corner, so there's only one, was it raid the vault? Yeah, there's only one vault in my opponent's table half.
00:29:19
Speaker
So he, Son of Selves is what let Misaki get up the board that quickly. Well, it's not something else that, um, is really nice about the Son of Selves is that because you get to treat them as shadow markers, but your opponent it doesn't get to treat them as your shadow markers. So any of the things that, cause shadow markers are destructible and I know being able to get, hey,
00:29:41
Speaker
That's another thing and add a marker helps to limit them. Well, you can't slam a sonless self or the various, um, uh, lost knowledge, smell whatever yeah markers. Well, they're not a marker. They are effectively a marker for you, but it's a marker that is protected from shit that would remove them. Otherwise, the one downside to that is I don't believe they give, because they don't, they don't give concealment to your opponent.
00:30:11
Speaker
which means they don't I don't believe they give you concealment either.
00:30:16
Speaker
um That is one downside because it is shadow markers are concealing. um Some of selves are not technically markers. There you go. Cool. So all right, the So we got through some of the pregame stuff um and ended up picking your crew. ah Any decisions that went into the crew building as you were like strategizing this out? Because yeah, you ran the same crew ah throughout the whole thing. um You weren't really swapping it up for tech picks or anything. But yeah, you anything that really went into as you're trying to figure out what to what to bring and how to build this crew,
00:30:57
Speaker
and as Well, so I just I chose Masaki because hey mobility and it's Masaki is a fun master to play being able to kind of pop up You know, we're gonna play Wacka Wacka Masaki except you're never in a position to Wacka Masaki. It's very fun um So I had Masaki and you know, you get Shang automatically because he's your totem. I like Shang Channel healing is a nice little heal kind of sucks. It needs a six, but hey, it's a heal and I wish he was incorporeal. He's a Firefox. After that, I was like, alright, cool. Hire Monago, Hire Rototo, Hire Fukatsu, automatically. Just win Muslim Fukatsu into the crew.
00:31:34
Speaker
um Just a laugh off 8 stone model, just he gets to a spot, and he just hangs out. Oh yeah, even nerf T's great. There's nothing more frustrating than so throwing Masaki into a terrifying like 11 terrifying 12 model and whiffing that 4 or 5 she needs with her whip 7. So having Ototo and Fuwatsu being ruthless is very nice.
00:31:58
Speaker
um I debated on Jhin, but because so many of these schemes relied on actual so scheme markers, being able to pop up on the sideboard and just say, all right, minion, you're gone. You're gone. Bye. And then to turn around and dispose of evidence on a scheme marker, they might have just dropped and draw a card. It was very nice. um And after that, he's got basically built-in. 235.
00:32:27
Speaker
Right, ignoring armor with hidden blade in the built-in crit strike. Inktip Dart did like, I want to say like seven or so damage to Molly in my game. Just a stat five, range 12 gun that gets plus flips from ungentlemanly affairs from all the shadow markers, distraction, and friendly fire. So it's very easy to force it through. um No triggers, but it's you know it's a 12-inch gun, right? Exactly, yeah. It can only be so good.
00:32:52
Speaker
But yeah, Jhin was kind of my, eh, I have too many stones. Let's hire Jhin. He's a cool character. And then I do the Terracotta because Terracotta are kind of 94 points. um Three guaranteed take the hits. Nefarious packed. I have never used Mold of the Other. I don't know how it works. I kind of just, they don't have a tactical action. It's never come up because inevitably my opponent just shoots the Terracotta to kill it straight out.
00:33:19
Speaker
Which, fair. has a seeking the hit on behalf of somebody yes It has a slow trigger, on it's mail which actually happened twice this tournament, which is wild. um They're significant, amusingly enough. um there They have better defensive stats than Vuhatsu, which is still funny. The statue is smarter than Vuhatsu.
00:33:40
Speaker
You're like, you love it. But like my thunderscrews a lot of times end up, I hire my master and then I hire their henchmen or their enforcers, whoever kind of fits in the crew. And then I put Fuhatsu in there, even if there's not really any support for him, right? It's like, I'm not playing Yoko 2, because A, I don't know how to play Yoko 2 very well, and B, everyone or their mother plays Yoko 2, and I don't think a Yoko 2 and Yoko 2 game would be very fun.
00:34:05
Speaker
I've never done it. I don't want to do it. yeah um Okay, living your life without that. yeah And then it's, you know, it's kind of like Christian mentioned playing guild from bayou because a lot of people are playing bayou bayou is starting to get their respective deserves. um Let's play something different. Especially if Houston has a lot of local bayou players. It's nice to kind of it's nice to play something that's, you know, it's you. It's not to be as but it's nice to play something different.
00:34:30
Speaker
Where you go up to your opponent and you're not just throwing the same master down and like, all right, cool. Mirror match time. Who's better at this at this master? um And outside Travis and I suppose Devin actually at this tournament, I don't see a lot of Masaki. Right. A lot of times it's Jacob Lynch. It's a lot of the talk is Jacob Lynch, Yoko, sometimes McCabe.
00:34:49
Speaker
um And then as masters come and go with Arata's and Nerfs, Yoyon-Lo too was the boogeyman when he first came out. Heck, I've played Asami too pre-WeWork. That was fun. I think it actually got talked about on this episode with ah um but Nick when he talked about a Jorgumo teleporting like 20 inches up the board with Riffmarkers.
00:35:12
Speaker
That's fun. I'm going to miss that slingshot. But a lot of times my crew ends up being like that. I hire the master. I hire kind of their their henchmen and their enforcers you know for fla to to flavor. right And then I look at, all right, cool. What do i what else do I need? And that's that's kind of going into the tech picks. I didn't really face anyone I really felt the need to tech against. Molly doesn't have any demise. She didn't have any armor.
00:35:35
Speaker
um Maybe work hard draw, but I don't know, Thunders, at least in Masaki's area, I don't think there's a lot of card draw. unless I go really out of keyword. And I prefer not to play out of keyword. I don't know, I'm a little bit of a purist like that. No, that's fine. That's totally, totally legit. Yeah. So awesome. So you got your crew built. You're coming in, you're looking at this scheme pool, and we may have mentioned it, but I'm
Tournament Scheme Choices
00:36:00
Speaker
going to mention it again. You're on corner raid the vaults, and our schemes are power rituals, sweating bullets, information overload, take prisoner, and ensnare.
00:36:10
Speaker
and so What did you end up picking and like kind of what went into that thought process? so With Catashiro, information overload is pretty pretty easy. um Even with the with the rework, they still have a sort of ah interact move interact. Pre-rework, they had a much easier interact move interact. No resources besides the initial summon. um They placed five.
00:36:32
Speaker
And then they can just eat they could absolutely eat accrual again, you know They could eat a dapperling any kind of scheme under your throat them They can they usually could just eat them because hey old flicker was just a free focus You can have up to three of and then you explode um And you can keep flickering once you hit three. You'll die, but you know that could be six nothing focus attacks. It's six it's six focus focus attacks, potentially, if you can consistently get that mass trigger. um But with Catashiro, information overload's not too difficult. um Misaki, interact, move, interact. Jin can get to a corner and be ah be on his own, just not moving for four turns in a corner, interacting.
00:37:12
Speaker
um That's another miss. That's one thing as we'll say miss play. I should have been moving gin a lot more turn to turn to interact. ah He kind of just sat there next to the point and and I think he interacted like once. um That's kind of a opportunity cost lost. um and It's one of those schemes where you don't have to.
00:37:34
Speaker
to figure out, oh, what well what's the end condition again? Shoot. It's do the thing and then do the thing again. Right. Just keep going. Yeah. And actually, the end stage is even easier because it it doesn't even care about where they are, just that you have more schemes on the board.
00:37:50
Speaker
Yeah. So now you're up against Molly, um and they got krullians that are great at removing ski markers. So is that a consideration? Or you're like, no. um It should have been. I should have killed those krullians after Archie. They should have been my target after that. um wasn crew again I underestimated. I i assumed why your side of the car line of sight, because that's a crazy deal if it doesn't. But no, it doesn't. And if I read the card, I would know. Oh, it doesn't require that. Yeah, it's really good. It's a very silly ability.
00:38:16
Speaker
um give them give them sidekick. For Forest Stones, give them sidekick. yeah Just bait them by dropping a scheme marker, making it where they want to get it. And then once they're there, I instantly prioritize killing it. So I force them to get close. You just you you you you put out the the the candy trap and then you just beat that kid. you got Yeah, you do. yeah like Those things are too good for their cost. ah Just the child catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. as As a Molly player, I will i will say that they're perhaps the only thing besides Molly and Archie that are good in the keyword. So I would i would not say they need a nerve. But if by there they are spectacular. That's that's not that's not a yeah that's that's not great. the
00:39:04
Speaker
Work way above your request No, they're great and we love them and and they're rubberized He did summon a rubberizer and that thing did ah did just sit on through hot sea for three turns. Oh Wow, lots of you are super fun to watch it And pick up a focus along with it. ah Oh, yeah. Good call um oh So what was your other scheme?
00:39:28
Speaker
My other scheme was sweating bullets. Speaking of schemes that no one takes. yeah um I love that scheme. Part of it was the corner raid the vaults. Those two vaults are within for the center line of center point, I should say.
00:39:48
Speaker
So it's very likely they'll end up with a henchman or a master. You know, Archie B-line towards the center of the board, right? Farshie goes, hey, that's where a Toto is, and let's go kill a Toto. um And then at the end of the game, Molly went to the center of the board. So granted, at that point, I didn't have anything to engage Molly, which is kind of a shame. um That's, again, I'll i'll talk about shoulda woulda couldas at the end there. But I find a lot of times henchmen are beaters, and the beater will go to the center of the board and contest those two center points.
00:40:18
Speaker
Yeah, so in the end state to corner raid I like that as just a as a kind of like yeah the reveal does kind of depend on your opponent But the end state just requires are not unengaged If they're at the center point at all So if there's no mass enemy master engine at that point, you just gain a VP regardless of anything else you have there Now once you reveal it's very easy to block it just late activate a henchman and just walk barely with it. Six inches is a huge bubble. But you know, it's just it's kind of if you have something that can if you do get last activation, you can position it right. You know, it's it's not a very. There's not a lot of setup required for it, I guess it. It's very it's you know, it can go either way. But depending on your crew, it can be hard to block that second point if you if you don't just. Because you have to get your henchman there.
00:41:12
Speaker
But you also have to keep them unengaged by your opponent to deny them the point. So it depends on the crew. But I'm looking at the other schemes. Pyro Ritual, Catashiro are good. um But that's, I don't know, I never really liked Pyro Ritual. I never played Cruise. I can really go quite that wide very quickly. And Catashiro, you know, summoning two with old Monaka, you need two, you know, two tens in hand and ah and usually a stone or two. um So I didn't really think about that. Take Prisoner.
00:41:39
Speaker
um I don't like the schemes that require you to select an enemy minion or enforcer, unless it's very predictable, just because ah where is that minion gonna go? You pick a crew again, he goes off to Narnia, it's like, all right, you're over there now. um What am I gonna do? yeah ah Granted, that's actually might've been a good one to choose, but it's also like, well, i'll pick the I'll pick the crew again. And then it just, as soon as I approach it, it goes, it's gone.
00:42:07
Speaker
right so I don't I don't really like the schemes that require me to pick an enemy model especially in a crew like Molly where it's like you're taking frugans or ah it's probably only minis eat their high risk frugans usually yeah outside of Andre's like weird bat thing he did for a little bit um no crack but take prisoner Again, picking enemy enforcer, so you kind of can't control that. I've done that, and like, well, OK, your enforcer ran off so you know it ran off to again. All right, cool. um And then in Snare, probably would have been good, too, just because of how much just free movement I have.
00:42:44
Speaker
um
00:42:47
Speaker
And again, Masaki can just interact, walk, interact around you. Catashiro can interact, place, interact. It's very easy to just dump out scheme markers. um But in this case, I went with sweating bullets and information over because again, Catashiro can drop a ton of ski markers. Jhin can drop ski markers and eat eat their ski markers after he places on their on their ah minions. Yeah, you do have some denial there in Jhin. I hadn't even thought about that, but no, that's great. And I denied Power Ritual. I denied Power Ritual for a couple of turns with Jhin because of that, because he just sat in a corner.
00:43:20
Speaker
He's like, yeah, you're you're not going to put it in this corner. You know, now you have to go all the way over to that one and in corner deployment, that can be rough. So yeah, sure final score, spoiler alert, file final score was four, four. How did it, yeah how did that break down on, uh, how many, so you were able to bolt points you got to do, do you recall?
00:43:40
Speaker
your point so so i'm actually i'm i'm looking at the score right now um turn one uh we both scored jonathan scored raid i scored uh information overload because that was when i was just trying to kill archy i was trying to yeah sorry turn two i was trying to kill turn one two technically speaking i did shoot in a couple times but turn one and two was kill archy you know um kill archy part one part two so I got an information overload just because, hey, Catashiro are fun. Catashiro are kind of silly. Turn three, I actually scored Raid the Vaults finally and Sweating Bullets, because that was when Molly, I believe it was Molly, that might have been, no, it was Molly. When Molly walked into the center of the board, I was able to score Sweating Bullets. Which did inform him, hey, I have Sweating Bullets. So that kind of led into turn four and five where things kind of turned off.
00:44:33
Speaker
So I'd been denying him a lot, um killing his dapperling. Because he had a krulligan and a dapperling go towards the top left corner. Jhin sent the krulligan back. right Sent him back to his room. And then he kind of just shanked the dapperling in the next turn. Because 2-3-5 is pretty good um um um you know on a little guy.
00:44:55
Speaker
um And so he never really got back to that corner. He scored power ritual he didn't score py ritual until turn 4 because he got the koruligan to my deployment zone for it for the other
Final Match Highlights and Strategies
00:45:08
Speaker
corner he needed. um And I was able to score raid the vaults and information overload because at that point without Archie.
00:45:14
Speaker
His Kelius model was ironic, was you know Molly and Phillip and the nanny. Those were his two Kelius models and that. Because I also think I killed the forgotten Marshall turn three, just because I don't want you to stop something cruel against. you know yeah Don't put those on the board anymore. Turn four is when I scored my last point for a second point of raid the vaults.
00:45:36
Speaker
And then he scored power ritual finally. And then turn five, I was running very low on time. I was also very low on models. So he just, by dint of being able to spread his stuff out and me not prioritizing the Keraligans, he had a lot of mobility left on the board at that point. So he was able to, at that point I had Fuwatsu, Misaki, and Jin. He walked, walked to the Necrotic Machine to block Jin's vault. He,
00:46:04
Speaker
put Molly in the center board to block sweating bullets. And he had a crew again by your side from Adelana site to Phillip and the nanny to walk and block Fuhatsu's vault. um But by that point, I'd blocked so many opportunities for schemes. He was able to sco and he was able to score information over once. OK. That's pretty cool. like it's Yeah, that's well done. you know He was able to drop one more ski marker than me and tie up the game. Yeah. um so
00:46:35
Speaker
So so that yeah it's a very low scoring game but not for like a trying he Yeah, I like this in clutch ups like especially where it's like, oh, I'm either losing or I'm tying this thing like well You know, like having a really yeah, jonathan Jonathan really just kind of looks like all right. What do I need to do? And he did what he needed to do. He he ignored Masaki off in his deployment zone because what can she do?
00:47:00
Speaker
um He didn't need to kill Jhin, he just needed to block Jhin, so he blocked Jhin. And he didn't need to kill Thuhatsu, he just needed to block Thuhatsu, so he did. And he he just then, everything else just interacted to score the last point, to score his one point from information overload. Yeah. No, that's cool. So, so tight game, which is just awesome. I do love, I do love those. So, all right, you have talked through a bunch of the game stuff. What was like maybe the single most interesting decision point that you had to make
00:47:31
Speaker
probably when to give up on molly okay um molly is a very annoying master to kill i i don't like it i wish she would stop being so hard to kill her your stats aren't incredible like if it's five is defense five um less caress is very annoying we don't have armor like even musaki has to respect that because if I took Misaki early. um By that point, usually I'm probably down two or three cards, and once I'm down three cards, that's three irreducible damage three times. And turn three and four, Molly was basically a turret. She was in the turn two, she got to the mid-board, and she just distributed story, distributed story, distributed story. got ah You know what? she did
00:48:14
Speaker
Jonathan did try to put a lot to killing Ototo. Ototo survived way longer than he had any right to from the amount of damage he was taking. um Between the Terracotta sprinting up to him, Ototo kind of desperately moving around this the high five strat marker and the can full concealment cloud, the block line of sight. Shang sprinting up to heal him and then getting pasted in return.
00:48:40
Speaker
um But I probably should have either gone into Molly harder to guarantee sweating bullets or gone into her less and not wasted AP chipping into her a little bit.
00:48:52
Speaker
Okay, because I didn't do damage, but I never committed enough to kill her. But I wasted enough AP where I, you know, I lost time and AP not, not, you know, commit, not actually ah ah achieving anything, if that makes sense. Oh, no, totally makes sense. And that is a tough, tough call. So yeah.
00:49:13
Speaker
um Yeah, and Serene countenance is it makes it very hard to force damage they like yeah, I have a king. I have a king in hand ah I'm on legs though, so it doesn't matter Yeah, and you focus and that's great and then you get it through on a straight, but you only get the one attack then and you're just like ah yeah And I granted charge through helps all out a lot with the damage through hard to wound charge through is very fun and But between that and Leth's Caress, a lot of damage went from Molly just from Leth's Caress. Because I played on that fire table with a lot of you know industrial um you know mining equipment. But a lot of the stuff in the center board was just height one.
00:49:55
Speaker
So once you got to the middle board, she had Lana site to basically everything and it was very difficult to Commit to killing something cuz yeah, I got I got three AP and Masaki that can be four damage onto Masaki. She doesn't have armor um I can shoot, you know twice about you. That's you know, two damage into philosophy every turn, you know Yeah, it's really powerful. Absolutely and granted like I said, there wasn't a lot of Lana site blocking terrain Outside of the strap markers which are not big enough because thought to is a big boy Ototo is a big boy And perfectly blocking a line of sight behind a 30 mil with a 30 mil is actually kind of tricky. It's very intent, like I intend for this to be perfectly between us. um
00:50:40
Speaker
And like ask thinking about Leth's caress and I'm certainly assuming that most of our listeners are familiar with that, but that it's that This model is this cruise leader after any model within lattice at at declares an action it has already cleared the string this activation It suffers two damage. It's not irreducible. It's blocked by armors walk by shielded um but it's just damage that you just take. It's uncontested. Yes, yeah really. There's no flip, it just happens. And so is that something that even in like list building, if you look back at the game, yeah we can look at lists to bring models that have like different attacks or whatever, maybe. I don't know. I would say it's less, less caress. Less caress is more of... It's hard to say. Less caress. It's...
00:51:32
Speaker
I wouldn't say what you would build around it. it's You have to be cognizant of it based on your model. Like Ototo and Fuhatsu, I didn't have as much a problem doing it because armor. It's producible. right You have armor, you take one damage. Ototo and Fuhatsu both have drug or not as their only bonus action.
00:51:51
Speaker
um Granted, that ties into the hand discipline and not blowing my hand early in the game. And then, oh, wait, Molly. Oh, oh, no. Disturbing story. No. um Nine damage. Here we go. um But I would say the bigger thing to play around Molly is disturbing story.
00:52:11
Speaker
um
00:52:14
Speaker
Because like one more question never came up. Constructive. I think he used constructive criticism maybe once or twice. um Lost knowledge came up to eat a couple shadow markers, but it was just like, you know, he wasn't a big furry. Most of Molly's AP was spent using disturbing stories. You just kill things. She brought it down very low. ah He is hard to kill, thankfully, so he didn't just die. um Ironically, that set up him to just kill Archie because grit frantic is is good. He is a heck of a drug. He she. Menaco only has eight health, so full to zero. Menaco in an activation, which hurt.
00:52:52
Speaker
um After Mako scored ah the first point of what's called ah sweating bullets, most of Molly's AP was walking and disturbing story. It's insanely good. It's one of the best abilities in the game. It's just three irreducible. What are you going to do against it? Six against willpower. If you're going into a knock-and-car-draw crew and the only car-draw I had was terracotta.
00:53:15
Speaker
Yeah. It made worse. You said at the top of the show, but made worse because of Arcane Reservoir. And you're just like, dang it. Here we go. I've only spent a couple of hours. She's not drawing a lot of cards. All right. I need to draw. All right. I'm done two cards. I'll draw. I'm done three cards. I'll draw. Oh, wait. No, I have seven in my hands a little. Damn it. Yeah. You know, when you're down to three and you draw a fourth one. No, that's not two. It's still three. It's handside seven.
00:53:44
Speaker
um
00:53:46
Speaker
But I would say um like playing into Molly, it's mostly, all right, what do I have that can take that can deal with Archie? Terrifying 12 is annoying. Monocos on fives, but that's still needing to flip a five. And then you blow a king. That would have been your crit strike. That's the worst. And he's a three. like Yeah, he can't be focused, but he's a three, four, six with Flurry.
00:54:09
Speaker
um And if he discards a card, he heals one, two, three, based on what he discard, right? So you have to focus him down. And I did have to focus him down. I spent a lot of AP killing Archie, because if I didn't, that's a three, four, six with a leap. I can get where he needs to go and start eating, you know, he can start chewing on Banyan, start chewing on Monaco. Oh, yeah. And he's bringing hooligans with him to scheme. And so you're just like, you know, he has to die.
00:54:35
Speaker
Yes, thank goodness. He's an enforcer. I don't want to see henchman Archie. um So, but still you, you did pull off a tie, which is fantastic. Uh, and ended up, uh, that, that gave you the, the, the record and the differential to, to come in second. So, uh, what was your most MVP model? Uh, most valuable models.
00:55:02
Speaker
It's kind of a, I'm kind of torn. Um, It's kind of. It's it's weird alright in terms of actually doing stuff. It might be.
00:55:15
Speaker
It's probably going to be, oh, geez. um And how about how about throughout the tournament? if it's if it's Throughout the tournament, it's probably a Toto, because a Toto spiked onto ah Fiona on game one with five severes and two damage flips. That was that was nutty um to kind of knock out all the Killy power in Nelly's crew. um He then proceeded to sprint to the deployment zone and score by second point of,
00:55:42
Speaker
um I can't remember what it is. It's one of the ones. And in your face, in your face. Just throwing the smoke bombs. And then just just friending and killing it, you know killing Jesse Holiday and and in one activation to get rid of scrap recycling and McCabe. It's probably Monaco, because having Catashiro as just disposable little interact missiles, Catashiro are incredibly good. And it's probably a just, it's definitely a justified nerf, their rework.
00:56:13
Speaker
Probably. 100%. I wish they'd just give them a 2-2-2, screw it. Make them not care about their damage flip. But a 1-2-2 that goes up to a 2-2-3 is fine. um it's I say probably. It is a good change. A stat-less, TN-less, place 5 on a significant model is incredible.
00:56:40
Speaker
Yes. Yes, it is. So makele attack making that require making that require a five mask, or I think it's a five mask. It won't be a four mask, honestly. It's kind of sure. Making that require a four mask, you know now it's just it's kind of ah it's you know it's it's a leap. You've got to have a resource for the leap now.
00:57:01
Speaker
um But you know what? You don't need a king to summon him. You don't need a certain king. You don't need to tend to summon him anymore. So it's like, eh, kind of a trade-off there. um But yeah, I'd say Monaco, just a move six henchmen with a two, three, five, and able to summon interact monkeys is very good. And she this Catashiro did a lot of work. But they only exist because of Monaco.
00:57:24
Speaker
Yeah. No, that's nice. That's great. already So we're looking at at the game afterwards now. And we always love asking about advice for kind of different tiers of players. So advice for our bottom third, and someone facing you for the first time. what would you And like maybe what's the worst gotchas that they would face in either Masaki in general or this crew in specific?
Advice for Facing Misaki's Crew
00:57:49
Speaker
int If they're playing into Masaki, the biggest thing is you want to have you it sucks too, but sometimes it's worth using the AP to destroy shadow markers. um Without shadow markers, Masaki's mobility is very limited. If she has none on the board, she has to do two irreducible damage to Shang. Not that he has any way to reduce it, but she has to do damage to Shang to show up on the board if she has no shadow markers.
00:58:13
Speaker
Depending on her crew, she might have limited Shadow Marker generation if she's not using Ototo and Banyang to crap out more Shadow Markers. um After that... Well, I mean, she doesn't have to pop out a shang. I mean, she can always unbury in her undeployment zone. Yes, but, you know, how relevant is she in that case, depending, yeah right? Situationally, yes, she can do that.
00:58:38
Speaker
And a lot of times shank ends up in your floating zone anyway because like I don't want to move him because he's just going to pop if someone looks at him too hard. yeah But if you have ways to remove shadow markers, ah if you know even if it's just an actual AP to slam, um I mean, I believe slam has what?
00:58:53
Speaker
slam has a small range. It's a one inch range. It's a one inch bubble. So if you can get into a field of shadow markers and slam one AP can get rid of a lot of her mobility and really hurt her. So and if you're playing shang and you walk them up my round three this guy put them on a building and I just one shot it immediately the moment it gets into line of sight that thinks dying. Yeah. ah Yeah. So shang is a defense five model with no damage reduction for health. And he is the only healer in keyword.
00:59:23
Speaker
outside of Juggernaut. And his healing can target buried models. So if you put the hurt on Misaki, Shang can heal her. And that can also unbury her. So it's if you have an opportunity to kill Shang, where it doesn't cost you other opportunities, it's worth killing Shang. Just because channeled healing is kind of clutch to heal Misaki, but she does take damage. Because she she does not have any, she has no damage reduction beyond stones. If you get into her, she takes damage.
00:59:52
Speaker
um
00:59:55
Speaker
So, yeah, limiting their mobility after that, most of her crew is moved five like got so like a total's move five. move five, Masagi's move five, Monaka's the fast maul at move six, Yamazee goes move four. um I guess, if you're appointed higher to Torikage, for some reason, they're move seven, but they're, you know, a scheme runner. They're not gonna run into you and kill you. um So, without the shadow markers to move her up the board, if she's stuck foot slogging,
01:00:21
Speaker
She's not going to get much accomplice, especially since she loses movement if she activates late. Every two models that activate, she loses um one inch of move. And that doesn't have a cap. If you know you if she you activate you know eight models, she's moved one.
01:00:37
Speaker
yeah and you're just like So if you've killed them those those forward shadow markers, she is stuck in the back with essentially no move. yeah um aht be this a big So I would say, yeah, if you have the opportunity, killing shadow markers is worth it. Because that also turns off Jhin's plus flips with his stat 5 gun. um It turns off ah bonding um ninja vanish. It turns off Monaka rates summoning Catashiro.
01:01:04
Speaker
Yeah, just really messes with you. So no, worth, worth bringing than that. It's, it's the, it's the eyes to any more. Yeah. If a crew relies on markers, killing those markers is probably a good thing to do. Yeah. And, and it's the, certainly that's the way she rolls. Now for obviously most people bring, um, uh, was your question into Masaki or just in general?
01:01:30
Speaker
Oh no, and it was a great answer. But now, most people are doing Misaki 1. If they're bringing Misaki 2, does she care about markers as much? Misaki 2 is weird. She has a very funny ink tip dart with shadow pin, where you get plus one damage if they're in concealment, or if they have concealment, or within three inches of a friendly shadow marker. He has plus one damage and staggered on a 1, 3, 5.
01:02:00
Speaker
You know, it's a 135 but hey ah staggered with a 12 inch gun that ignores concealment. um She's an she's an obey master with this with the mask built in. which is kind of cool, and she can add suits. um If she targets a model within three inches of a friendly shadow marker, she can add suits to all of her attacks, all of her actions. So she can build in the crow for shadow pin. She can build in a crow for giving injured one on her obey, or a tome for a focus one on her obey. She can build in the tome for her ah friendly berry to put a model into the ground like Masaki won for it to pop out of another shadow marker.
01:02:38
Speaker
yeah um The problem with Misaki is Misaki 2. um You lose the damage that Misaki 1 can do, but you also lose the interact AP with Misaki 1. Misaki 1 is a 3 AP that can go wherever it needs to go, interact, move, interact. Misaki 2 can't do that. She can turn her AP into other models, but like comparing her to Lucius, she still doesn't draw cards.
01:03:08
Speaker
um And she doesn't enhance those model she obeys. There's it's still just a regular obey Okay, um, so that makes sense. But even if even basically as a tier you know, a lower tier player that it's still good to bring marker removal, even if your person... Yeah, because you get rid of... maaki a ...and give you a Misaki tube. You get rid of her marker, she loses but adding built-in suits to her duels. Makes sense. That also turns off twisting paths wrapped in darkness, berry trigger, which basically lets Ototo pop out of a shadow marker wherever he wants.
01:03:44
Speaker
Yeah. OK. So no, that makes good sense. So um let me ask, so when you were a bottom third player with Misaki, what was your biggest lesson learned at that point? As you started playing her, is it just like how to play Shadow Markers properly or when to activate her? What was your biggest lesson? The biggest lesson playing learning Misaki is you don't, it's, you know,
01:04:12
Speaker
You know, it's not the ABCs always be charging. It's maybe you don't charge with Masaki this turn. Maybe you go use your interact or scheme, or maybe you don't charge her at the master or the beater. Cause yeah, she's a stat seven, but it's a two four five. So if you can't get that, that high Ram for crit strike.
01:04:28
Speaker
You get that negative flip. All right cool. You did two damage. Congratulations. Maybe you did three. You just flipped into a ramp. Or they have armor and you did one and you're just like, that was great. Yeah. So it's like, Masaki is an assassin. Use her to go kill the squishy things. Like go throw her at, I don't know, like a guild lawyer or a nurse, right? Or a totem if you need to, right? If, you know, if you're playing Dashal, go kill that stupid dispatcher.
01:04:54
Speaker
Yes, that bottle is silly um but or in my games, um, Misaki end up killing things like um
01:05:06
Speaker
Camera bots honestly cuz camera bots are annoying little models. She killed wicked That's the and and again, that's taking interacts and that's taking AP off the board and that's that's great So yeah, that's good advice like like yeah don't necessarily go for the biggest ass me go for a lot of little ones and you'll do just go for something that you can that doesn't have the because again a 245 is good, but it's not a 345 and Against armor, she could be doing one damage. Against armor shielded, she can do no damage very easily with that with that min too. Granted, she has an execute trigger, but no way to build in the crow reliably, so that's a little tough. um Another big thing with Masaki is activation order. She gets slower the longer you wait, and ah her bonus action is built around her activating early.
01:05:53
Speaker
um For each other friendly model that is not activated, this model shovels a card from of its choice. Of its choice, not there's no Joker restriction back into its that Fate deck from its discard pile. So i I had a game where I'd write to NoSaki early, I'd flipped like like like four or five Severe's and the red, and they all ended up back in my deck.
01:06:13
Speaker
um And with a crow, every crow you shuffle with a crow trigger on that, every time you shuffle in a crow, a model with an eight inches and a lot of sight has to either discard a card or gain stunned. And that stunned can be useful. That stunned is really neutered Fiona in game one, because a stunned Fiona does damage, but she doesn't have any of her triggers, and she only has that two AP. And it's not, there's no way to dodge it outside of not being inherent in a lot of sight, and outside eight. If you're with an eight, I can choose that model to discard a card.
01:06:45
Speaker
so um So I'm going to pause you because I know that we, I'm just going to pause you. And so, uh, cause I want to shift to advice for a middle third player, somebody who's actually experienced, uh, with the game and looking to give you a challenging game and what kind of advice would you give that for playing? Well, the last, so kind of segue the, at this point, I hope you know your crew.
01:07:09
Speaker
Um, because like Lord knows in my games, once I, you know, our first couple of games, I was having to reference into my cards a lot. It's like, oh wait, what's the stat on this? What's the stat on that? What's the stat on that? And so on and so forth. Um, middle third. Yeah. Kinda can't just be reactionary. You kind of have to go and do stuff at that point.
01:07:31
Speaker
um You can't let your opponent kind of set the tempo you have to be trying to do stuff like you can't just let your opponent Go, you know, it's like Jin is a reactionary piece, right? I'll throw out Jin to react to power ritual Masaki I Will I need to be I want to use Masaki to do something not in response to my opponent necessarily I want to throw Masaki out and to have her drop two schemes and now my opponent has to react to that um The crew is so mobile um
01:08:02
Speaker
I find that when I can really leverage that mobility and force my opponent to spread out to kind of block things where it's like, all right, I have models set up in the middle for sweating bullets. Hopefully you're going to come at me now. I have a bunch of ski markers being dropped by Catashiro and Jin off in the corners and the sides. You've got to react to that now.
01:08:23
Speaker
um I have a Toto right a Toto Monaco kind of walking up in the middle. All right, that's you know, I'm in three beater with grit frantic and An assassin who if you miss and she gets that mask you now take damage when you when she takes damage um So you kind of need to not react to your opponent because that at that point I they can do the exact same thing back to you. They can set up multiple threats where, all right, I have to block this scheme, and I have to kill this thing, and I have to do this thing. And another another part of that is if you need to do something, you need to commit to doing it. Otherwise, it's just a waste of your time and your AP. Like, again, when I went at Molly, I didn't commit to killing Molly, so Molly was still free to walk up and block sweating bullets for me because I didn't commit to killing her.
01:09:13
Speaker
I said through Misaki at some vault that in hindsight was like, yeah, no, why did I do that? He had way too many models. I could just walk up and ah block the other vaults I had available to me.
01:09:27
Speaker
No, it makes good sense.
Advanced Strategies and Tactics
01:09:29
Speaker
It's like my first game into Andreas Nelly. I'm actually going to interrupt. Oh, go ahead. I'm sorry. I'm going to interrupt only because, yeah, otherwise we'll end up talking about Nelly for 20 minutes. Well, just an example. I committed to killing Nelly, right? You commit to something that needs to happen, or it's, again, you just wasted your time. Got it. Awesome. So how about advice for a top third player?
01:09:50
Speaker
ah What do you wish you'd done? it like What advice would you give to yourself?
01:09:58
Speaker
To myself, it'd be all right. Don't zero in on trying to score all three of these sayings. Look at, all right, cool. What can my opponent actually block? Like if I have the strat, I have my two schemes, what can my opponent, what can I score and what can my opponent stop? So like playing Jonathan, he had so many models that were significant that could very easily block raid the vaults.
01:10:23
Speaker
Right? Necrotic machine can move 10 inches. Crueligants can go where the heck they want, because at that point, he had nothing but enforcers and characters on the board, besides the crueligants. um yeah But also, AP means, all right, I need to commit to one of my schemes. I need to commit to scoring, um to dropping scheme markers. Or I need to commit to getting them all on the center board. um But because, again, I'd wasted time in AP trying to kill Molly, I was in a position where if I didn't,
01:10:52
Speaker
put myself on those raid the vaults, I wouldn't be able to block him for doing so. That's kind of the situation I ended up in. Don't look at the score. And because of that, I wasn't able to block raid the vaults at all on turn five, because I just didn't have the vaults to do it. So it's like me trying to score raid the vaults at that point was like, why did I try to do that? I should have tried to put something in the middle to get sweating bullets. Put Masaki in the middle, because she's got 12 health.
01:11:20
Speaker
He doesn't have a lot of beaters in the middle. He has Molly, who can do, at most, nine damage to Masaki. Right. Well, she's going to kill her. She's going to kill her. Now she's in the middle, scoring me sweating bullets. So it's just it's things like that. it's Look at what you could do, but also look at what your opponent could feasibly block.
01:11:37
Speaker
um And granted, most top three players probably know this because they're probably better than me. But it's it's it's something that I've learned to get to where I win or tie more games than I lose. Yeah. is And that makes sense. Don't just play your strats. Play your opponent's strats. Once they declare them, it's like you can look at the app and see what their strats are. Look at what their end state is. right Oh, they scored an information overlook. I need to have more scheme markers on the board than they do by the end of the game.
01:12:07
Speaker
Yeah. And maybe that means kind of sharing the sake, just drop four ski markers on, on one term. And I just use that AP to do that. That's a point blocked potentially. Yeah, exactly. and And that's even independent of if the fact that you had taken information overload as well. And you're like, yeah, it's a direct conflict. That's a two for one special, right? yeah Now granted, I still lost that because, hey, when you when your opponent has 10 minutes left in the clock and double your model count, it's not that hard to drop a bunch of scheme markers. so
01:12:42
Speaker
Unfortunately true. All right.
Playful Discussions and Humor
01:12:44
Speaker
Now, fantastic discussion. that We love taking questions from our Discord, and so we've got one more question for you. and and this is ah We're going to circle back to our a and trying to trying to kind of milk this foodie plus malefoe thing.
01:13:03
Speaker
And so, uh, Dyceman, uh, Jim Dyson, uh, from the other coast podcast, uh, asks, imagine that you have been invited to dinner by one of the models that you hired this game. So which model do you wish invited you and why? And then what dessert are you going to bring to that meal?
01:13:24
Speaker
I'd hope it's Fuhatsu because half of my crew works for Masaki and she's you know a tried Yakuza boss who in lore is also going crazy with Paranoia and hallucinating her dead father. So I don't know if I want to go to dinner with her. Jin is also a spy who will stab people so it's like maybe I don't want to go with him. But Fuhatsu, he's got people willing to hold him up as he shoots his gun.
01:13:47
Speaker
Yeah, his his official model. Happy guy. Yeah, his official model is is is four dudes loyal, loyal enough to him, even though he's got like brain damage or whatever to to keep supporting him on the battlefield as he shoots his gun. Right. He's probably got a bunch of a bunch of buddies. um You know, he's not going to do any kind of courtly dinner. He's going to he's going to be in a barrack somewhere, I'm sure.
01:14:11
Speaker
Right, because they're not going to put him in ah in a diplomatic situation. So it's going to be real casual, you know, bunk food, you know. What would your, what would your dessert be? Uh, I can't cook. Uh, just pick any dessert. You can order my my dessert a choice. oh Um, it's just, what would you bring to the, I'm kind of like, make honestly, it might be like a sourdough chocolate cookie.
01:14:36
Speaker
sourdough chocolate cookie that sounds good oh yeah now my sister's gotten to bacon she's done been doing that a lot oh that's good we all we all do get togethers with her niece so uh she'll do a lot of sourdough cookies so that's kind of been my go-to for now No, that sounds amazing. If if we can get that, we will we will hunt down a recipe. I'll hunt. i' I'll hit her up for the recipe. so super We will drop that in the Discord chat. Dude, I'm at your house right now. Where's the recipe?
01:15:08
Speaker
Oh, that is fantastic. Jim's already in there. You never saw him coming. Oh, no. This is a clone. My dogs will bark at nothing walking in front of the house, but they'll miss the guy breaking him out from my cookies. Damn it.
01:15:22
Speaker
Don't take my cookies. so No, that's awesome. Great discussion. Thank you very much. That was like all kinds of deep and and all kinds of information, and I really, really appreciate it. um Looking across the the camera here at Christian and Doug, you guys got any questions? No, he answered everything. I'm golden. Yeah,
Gratitude and Community Appreciation
01:15:41
Speaker
all righty. You got any plugs or parting thoughts there, Cameron?
01:15:46
Speaker
ah Honestly, I'm glad I got into Malpho. I'm playing a lot of Age of Sigmar, but I don't know. Malpho kind of scratches an itch that a lot of games can't. but it just in It's the flavor of its of its models. Every model has so many rules. You get good flavor in them compared to ah most other games, honestly. speak honestly um I just scratched an itch and I'm super glad that, uh, Clay, you were able to so turn around and just kind of pull this event out of nowhere. So props to you and props to the people at Dragon's Lair and the Medical Center San Antonio for, uh, giving us those tables. That was great.
01:16:23
Speaker
that was amazing and then they honest did a good job and they they were their their manager was not happy the day before um and and he is a fantastic guy but he was not happy about the short notice but um it was yeah they they came through and the crew that was there that day was just amazing so now it was great and shout out to doug for kind of building up that expectation like hey there's a tournament here and now you're getting so many people interested in it because Lord knows um with all the, because like Andre and them, they do a lot of, you know, local Austin crew does a lot of ah tournaments, does a lot of big tournaments, travel tournaments. So the Austin crews kind of died out a bit. So props to Doug for keeping keeping the game kind of alive and in my mind and in my thoughts a little bit.
01:17:09
Speaker
Well, and this is one crazy thing. And this is the first time that in God, probably two years where I haven't been able to run the monthly attorney. Yeah. it It just took a sugar hurricane. It just took a record breaking hurricane, earliest hurricane ever to do it.
01:17:32
Speaker
Yeah. And I would say i got I gotta throw, I need to echo that plug because, um, like I know Doug, that you do a lot of work to pull tournaments together, but oh my God, like I did a fraction of the work that you did and it was a lot. It was a lot, a lot. And so thank you Doug for everything that you do month in and month out. Like.
01:17:57
Speaker
Rain or shine unless the rain is like hurricane sized. You're throwing a tournament at Dragon's Lair in North Houston and oh my gosh it's fantastic. The Texas Power Grid did its best to stymie us but we persevered.
01:18:12
Speaker
Yeah, so anyway, so thank you, Doug. And yeah, great, great, great plugs and shout outs there, Cameron, pretty
Promoting Upcoming Events and Opportunities
01:18:18
Speaker
much. Oh, hey, is' speaking of tournaments I'm running, I'm going to do a plug real fast here. So just wanted to remind everyone that the Lone Star Fodown Malifaux GT is coming up in October. Tickets are available now. It has taken place October 11th through the 13th.
01:18:39
Speaker
twenty twenty four We're throwing the gauntlet down. Come, come mess with Texas. It was the largest Malefoe event in North America last year and are hoping to get even bigger this year. Well, I'm, I'm hoping that we, you know, sell out the space. You just know that if y'all guys show up, you will be playing against me. All right. So it's, it's going to be a fun time. And like, there never ever, both times we went, we had so many players both times.
01:19:07
Speaker
There's amazing prize sport. Everybody's amazing in the community. It's really good time. And I mean, I recommend it. Like every time we get our money's worth, like they always give us a shirt, you know, like it's a blast, you know, it's worth going and it's a great community to support at all. I don't, I don't think you should pass up on it. Plus you play some really amazing players. Like I got to go over some really really good players. I don't normally get to see, uh, danger planet showed up. That's crazy.
01:19:35
Speaker
again i believe they're planning on coming again so you know sign up for it it's good it's the first that's one of the biggest turns i've ever gone to for in general actually and it was uh it's a lot of fun yeah once again you guys get to play me if you go so that's uh that's uh you know a win-win yeah you know what you know you know what having played you those games are rough but you're you're you're a fun opponent and I don't mind. I don't mind getting getting beat up by you. You're a fun opponent. I try to be, you know, I try to, you gotta to bring fun to the game or else it's not fun at all. It was awesome. So all right. Well, listen, thank you guys very, very much. Thanks to all the listeners who have stuck with us and we will catch you all later. Farewell. Thanks guys. Thank you.
Credits and Acknowledgements
01:20:20
Speaker
Students of Conflict is brought to you by Top Dog Design. Check out topdogdesign dot.com for all of your Malifotrain needs. Top Dog Design, 3D printable designs to enhance your tabletop. Students of Conflict is not an official product of Root Miniatures LLC. All intellectual property belonging to weird miniatures is used with permission. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of entities they represent. Any content provided by our guests and or hosts are their opinion and not intended to malign any group, club, organization, company, individual, or anyone or anything. Whoo!
01:21:17
Speaker
Insert Fodown information here. I'm not gonna bother re-recording that again, because I already did, and I'm not gonna be doing any editing. Oh, before I end the recording, Cameron, could you please say hello? Hello.