Shopping List - Collodi, Neverborn

So, it's been a bit quiet here, but it's time to break the silence with the first guest writer. 

This man knows his Collodi and he was a requested Master, so without further ado...

Hello there folks! Not-Panzer here, let me start with a quick introduction… no wait.

There, that pretty much had to be first right? Anyways, I’m Graeme (Tayne on the forums when I bother to post) and one of Panzer’s teammates. I played Collodi pretty heavily earlier in the year to some success and much swearing by our friendly, resident tank-impersonator. Someone on twitter requested a shopping list for our Puppet Master so, for my faults (and they are legion), I volunteered my duties.

Naturally enough, I’m going to break Panzer’s established three sets rule a little. Collodi has two limited upgrades granting him two different playstyles, ergo I’m going to give you two sets of three. I honestly thought I would prefer one heavily and ended up loving the other, but all that tells us is that, when you get down to it, I’m a bit of a muppet at times (I agree with this sentiment - Panzer).

Fated Collodi 

Fated Collodi is primarily a support master, giving his AP to his crew to get the work done they need, passing on focus or defensive and passing one effigy buff out to his crew each turn. Which leads to our first pick.

1. Brutal Effigy

Collodi can hire any puppets, which gives him access to the seven faction effigies. Now they are of varying use depending on the situation, but the Brutal Effigy is the only one I would put as required. On top of decent stats (for a 4SS minion), it’s his zero we’re looking at here. Fear Not The Sword gives the ability to heal 1 damage after doing damage and draw 1 card after killing an opponent. Pretty good right? It gets better.

Collodi will carry Strum the Threads every time he’s played. He just will. This allows any puppet activating within aura 6 to take 2 damage and go Fast (yes, that includes Collodi himself). 2 damage to self for 3 chances to heal through this buff. The card draw is icing on the cake here, you will not regret taking him.

As a side note, you can use his poor shooting attack to hit Collodi and give the Puppet Lord a free 3” push each time. You may have to cheat to make sure the attack misses though.

2. Stitched Together

These fiendish little treasures will have your opponents cursing you up and down every street of whatever town you’re playing in. Gamble Your Life is a shockingly powerful attack, dealing an uncheatable 3/4/7 to the loser of the duel with no + or – applied.

Now this does mean they can end up dealing a hefty damage to themselves. This is mitigated this by a) picking targets you can bully (Ca6 vs Df, pick the targets with the lower Df stat as a priority) b) them having Hard to Kill and c) getting reactivate when they drop to 1 wound remaining. Yeah, they only have one wound left, but another activation is very, very strong.

3. Widow Weaver





It’s a non-puppet! Yet she is thematically involved with Collodi as she can create Wicked Dolls with her upgrade (it’s an expensive upgrade though - I personally don’t take it) and giving friendly Constructs that activate within 6” of her +1 Wk. Remember those Stitched? Their downside is having a slow Wk4, good old Widow mitigates this for use.

But wait, there’s more. She drops Web markers at the rate of one a turn, lowering the Wp of enemies by 1 per marker within 3”. Collodi’s sole attack is against Wp. Nice. It also boosts her own Terrifying (All) to a potentially higher level. Be wary though, she only has a Df4 and will drop quickly if your opponent focuses fire on her.

I’ll give a quick nod here to Luke Cocksedge, a seasoned Collodi player who runs this Fated list regularly and schooled me with it at Bending Fate. Well played that man, your Collodi is terrifying.

Bag of Props Collodi

With this upgrade, Collodi becomes greedy and steals Focus or Defensive off nearby models to use for himself. He comes with plenty of Marionette totems that can become Focus-fodder in the box, no extra purchases needed there (I generally take 2-3). So, what do I put in his three?

1. Brutal Effigy

Yes. He’s that good he makes both lists.









2. Doppleganger (cue Rooney tinnitus...Eeeeeee-Doppleganger-in-a-dodgy-Canadian-accent-eeeeeee)

You can’t be surprised she made the list somewhere, right? This model is amazing. She has Don’t Mind Me for Interact shenanigans, Ill Omens for Initiative shenanigans and the ability to copy actions on top of a high manipulative value for her defence. She is amazing and almost always causes a pain for your opponent. She is also valued by every Neverborn Master if you’re thinking about later expansion. Buy her, you won’t regret it.









3. McTavish

It’s a tough choice here, you definitely want something big and scary and Nekima or a Teddy could easily be hired if you want to stay in faction or Lazarus as an alternate mercenary, but allow me to explain my reasoning.

Collodi is scary. His attack doesn’t randomise and ignores cover, it has a built in slow trigger and other triggers to make your opponent make an immediate 1 action or steal their first AP when they activate. He is mean and deserves far more hate than he has right now, in my opinion. He is, however, just one model.

Now look at McTavish. A 14” gun that ignores cover, doesn’t randomise and has an excellent damage track. Oh, and that the Doppleganger can mimic for you. On top of this, he has a healthy melee attack to boot. With him, Collodi and the Doppleganger you have a huge control area that your opponent should fear to enter. Nice, eh?

Honourable mention – Mannequin

Now I know I said I’d only do two sets of three, but the Mannequin has a certain place for me that I think needs highlighting. This is due to its 1 action, Magician’s Assistant, which allows models within 2” to place scheme markers anywhere with 6” rather than in base contact with themselves.

That’s right, scheme markers are like Frisbees now.

Now you do still need to keep them 4” from other markers as usual, and you cannot interact if you are engaged (usually, oh hello there Doppleganger!) but this makes schemes like Set Up fairly trivial to complete with Collodi. If I’m taking one of these, I normally have at least two Marionnettes in the list as well to use alongside.

Anyways, that’s all for me. I really need to stop procrastinating and paint models ready for the Nationals…

Apologies to Graeme for taking so long to post this. Yes, he did send it to me before Nationals. But I'm also a muppet. 

Hope you enjoyed the article!

Shopping List - Pandora, Neverborn

So I've been asked to do a shopping list article for the Neverborn Master Pandora. Pretty sure the guy who asked me, the living legend that is Joel Henry, was joking, but I'm gonna call his bluff!

 

Pandora is a Master who many players have a negative opinion of. They believe that games involving her are non-games, and she takes the fun out of Malifaux. 

1. Warmachine Rulebook

 

I am one of those people. I hate playing against Pandora. If you haven't got the right crew to play against her or you're playing against her for the first time, she's just an absolute nightmare. The technical term is NPE or negative play experience. For that reason I don't condone using her and have never contemplated playing her, because there is always that inherent risk of your opponent having an awful game. That's just not a risk I'm prepared to take. 

So. If you're considering playing Pandora. Don't. Put the box back on the shelf. Or buy it for Baby Kade, then melt down the Pandora figure and burn the cards. 

If any of what I've said above actually appeals to you, and you just want to stomp noobs, then please f*ck off and play Warmawhores and leave the rest of us alone. 😛

Shopping List – Lady Justice, Guild

Here we are again, the first of a new series of articles.

One of the questions I get asked most by new players is what they should get to go with their shiny new crew box. Seeing as I’ve been round the metaphorical Malifaux block a lot, it’s one I can answer as I’ve played either with or against pretty much everything.



So this series is going to give 3 sets that I think go well with a particular Master. As with all these articles these are just my opinions, but as per usual I’m hoping that they at least give you ideas.

The first one I’m going to do is my favourite Master, one who I think is underplayed and underestimated – the mighty Lady Justice.

1. Brutal Effigy



I’ll square with you. I gave Lady Justice’s official totem the Scales of Justice a couple of games, thought ‘what is the point of this’ and he’s been sitting in the case ever since.

The Brutal Effigy is everything her totem should have been. He hands out a condition called Fear Not the Sword – every time Lady Justice does damage, she heals 1 damage, and every time she kills, she draws a card. Given that doing damage and killing is what she’s about, keeping her alive longer to do more of it and gaining cards to help in the process is a real benefit.

Added to which, he’s only 4SS, is a Minion who can interact, and his 4 Wounds doesn’t look like much but with Df6, Armour 1 and Hard to Kill he still takes some shifting.

This little guy should be the first name on the team sheet after Justice herself.

2. Master Queeg



A slightly left-field choice, but I’ve been getting an awful lot of mileage out of Queeg alongside Justice.

Reason 1 is the Promises upgrade he can take. It gives everyone with an upgrade within 6” positive flips when they attack in melee. Guess why that’s good with Lady Justice?

Reason 2 is the built-in push on Queeg’s melee attack. One of the big reasons I get so much mileage out of Lady Justice is the Henchmen slingshot I use to get her into the thick of the action early, and pull her back out again if there’s a problem.

Stage 1, Francisco Ortega walks up, uses Cover Me from the Hermanos de Armas upgrade to pull Justice 5” up, and clears the way. Stage 2, Judge walks twice and uses Stand for Judgment to pull her another 5”. Queeg can potentially add another couple of pushes to this off his attack, and he can also send her round corners as his is a push in any direction.

Using this set-up, my record is Lady Justice 14” out of her deployment zone and past some blocking terrain, with El Mayor and Fear Not the Sword on her, before activating turn 1. I can tell you straight up, there’s not a lot scarier for the opposing crew than that much pain that close that early!

3. The Lone Marshal 



Another lesser seen but still very good choice is the Lone Marshal.

Lady Justice is a fantastic killer. She likes having other killers along. She also likes having the Lone Marshal along. That’s because he can do the killing role himself, either finishing off the wounded or picking off weaker models trying to get away from Justice. Never underestimate how good Trick Shooting is – push 6”, take a focussed Sh6 shot that does 2/3/5, then push 4”. He’s the Tau jumpsuit of the Malifaux world.

Lone Marshal is also Wk6, and with Numb to the World he becomes a scheme runner that is very hard to stop. He can decide not to gain harmful conditions, and can discard a card to stop enemy models making him take actions.

For a long time I’ve ignored this guy, but since Numb to the World became a thing with Ripples of Fate I’ve been giving him another look and he’s been well worth the Soulstones ever since.

So that’s the first Shopping List article. If you have any Masters you want me to give the treatment, drop me a line and I’ll happily waffle on!