Malifaux M2E: Masters I've Played

So after playing for a while, I have been trying to figure out who my favorite master is in M2E.  The biggest problem is that I haven’t played every master with its most current rules, so some of these guys will be based on my feeling of their playstyle in previous incarnations.  Weekly updates to the rules are fantastic, but they reset me back to zero every week!

So here are the masters I feel I’ve seen enough to be able to make an informed opinion on.  There are a few others that I have played only once that I didn’t feel like I got a great feel for, so they didn’t make the list.

Jakob Lynch – I had a boatload of fun playing this guy when I had him on the table, except when it came to the Brilliance aspect of him (which seems pretty high on importance to him, but I always liked his card-sharking abilities more).  He feels like he’s improved in his ability to manipulate cards, but stepped back in his ability to keep off Brilliance.  Usually I’m only getting one or two models with Brilliance out there, which is plenty for his 52 Card Pickup auto-damage at the end of the turn.

Lady Justice – It’s been a while since I had her on the table, but she seems very reminiscent to how she was in the past.  You don’t want to be near her, or she will take the sword in her hands and chop you in half.  There might have been a missed opportunity to play her up as the inspiring figure that commands from the lead.  The figure that other Guild fighters would follow to their deaths.  She can get some of that with her upgrades, but I would have liked to see that come out much more.

Perdita – Gone is the Alpha Strike (thankfully).  Here are the days where the Family members actually seem useful.  I rarely played Perdita in v1, but I remember being happy when I saw any of the Family on the board against me.  Nino and Santiago were the most common ones, and despite people trying to use them well (Guardian on Santiago was one of my favorite huge point sinks to see across from the table) I never found a problem taking them down.  Now the Family feels like it should, supporting each other.  Perdita’s gotten a new life in my book.

Lilith – What a change!  I know it’s not the most popular change out there, but Lilith went from being a fast melee machine with a little bit of control to a control master with a melee punch to back it up.  Her spells, especially the ones on her upgrades, are top notch.  And unlike most other control masters, she’s no slouch when you reach her either.  Rather than being an in-your-face master, she’s become a gorilla warfare master.  Unlike Marcus who leaps out and smacks you around then fades away, Lilith and her crew grab you and yank you away from your supports and pounce on you that way.

Zoraida – The unquestioned Queen from v1 – how did she fare in her move to M2E?  Her Voodoo Dolls are no longer the annoying “If she has LOS to you, you’re screwed” piece they were and actually feel a lot more dynamic to me than they used to.  Maybe not in what they do themselves, but in how you use them.  Yanking on them, putting out Conditions, hitting them, etc.  There’s a lot more to do to a Voodoo Doll’s target, even if there’s less to do with a Voodoo Doll.  She’s also got one of my favorite upgrades in Crystal Ball.  But she’s lost a lot of her former speed.

Pandora – One of my least favorite models in v1 is back around in M2E, and she’s taken a big power hit.  Funny that to me, her big power hit still leaves her looking pretty nice in the scheme of things.  In the past, she would be played back about 8” or so from the field and was really obnoxious with Crows.  Now she’s got to be up in your face.  I find I like having her about 3” from my opponents, right in the thick of things.  Combine Candy in there and the crew is a boatload of fun.

Von Schill – The Henchman-turned-Master shows his face.  I really liked Freikorps in v1 because they felt like the underdogs – a Henchman (even if he was awesome) with a very limited crew selection trying to face down the enemy.  Here, new Von Schill feels… honestly, a little boring to me.  It might be the lack of flavorful options available so far (Strongarm, Librarian, Trapper… where are you!), but so far he seems pretty light on options.  I do still love the idea of the well-oiled merc group, so I’ll have to keep an eye on him in wave 2.

Seamus – Heh heh heh.  I love this guy’s changes.  His flavor just felt like “big scary guy” in v1, but in M2E, he’s picked up the mass murderer who can come out of the shadows and drag you back into the alley.  You’ll never find him.  His upgrades really help make the master flavorful.  You can take him in several different directions.  A huge improvement over his v1 version.

McMourning – Of all the guys on the list, he’s probably one of the most changed (I’d argue Lilith is probably second most).  Gone are body parts, here to stay is poison.  His summoning is a bit different – both harder and easier to pull off.  He doesn’t need the card anymore, but he does need a bit of help with getting the Poison out there.  Scalpel Sling was taken away – one of my favorite v1 abilities for him – but was replaced with some fantastic other tech for him.  Overall, happy with his new tricks too.

So which of these masters make the top of my list?  Right away I can remove Von Schill and Lady Justice.  They’re fun to play, but not when compared with some of the other tricks I can try with other masters.  Perdita and Jakob fall off next leaving me with the three Neverborn and two Resser masters.  So my top five:

Number 5: McMourning

I am really enjoying him, and I’m hoping my enjoyment working with him will increase the more I get the hang of the Scheme Markers.  They’ve been a great new tool in the game and I know there’s a lot more I could be doing with them that I’m just not yet.

Number 4: Zoraida

It saddens me that she’s this far down the list, but I’ve been finding it a little challenging to feel like I’m getting the most out of her.  Of course, when I first started playing v1, I didn’t really get all of her tricks yet either.  She’s not firing on all cylinders yet.  Nearly every game I play with her, I feel like I could have done better by doing something else.  Lots of depth there – just gotta puzzle it all out.

Number 3: Seamus

His Back Alley alone is making me love this model.  More than any other master, I feel like he’s hitting his fluff perfectly.  The image of him popping out from behind a building that you thought no one was in and stabbing someone with his knife and then dragging the body away never to be seen again always jumps through my mind when I’m playing him.

Number 2: Pandora

I’m actually a little surprised she’s as high as she is on my list given how much I disliked her in v1.  I don’t feel as invulnerable with her anymore, and I have to be much closer to the action than I used to.  But Neverborn has a fair number of ways to punish models for being up close.  She provides a lot of control, and I do love control.

Number 1: Lilith

Speaking of control, Lilith has become my favorite master to play so far.  Being able to sneak around and harpoon models into melee with my beaters and then wreck them makes me smile.  Nephilim have a lot of pushes and movement tricks to them, and Lilith has plenty of those to spare.  Nothing is safe from her.  She gives the perfect vehicle to set up traps for your opponent’s models, and that’s one thing I’ve always enjoyed in games.

Now to be sure, this will all change before too long.   Heck, I’m clicking “post” and already rethinking them.  But for now, I’ll stick to this list.

What about you all?  What masters have you been enjoying in M2E and why?

Malifaux M2E - Privateer Press and Wyrd Open Beta Experiences

I haven’t been shy about my gaming history.  For miniatures games, it’s actually been pretty light on different systems.  I got into miniatures well after most of my other gaming, and the first game I played a lot of was Warmachine.  The second game I played a lot of was Malifaux.

I was around both games when they went through a major edition shift.  I was thinking back to my days at the Privateer Press world.

Warmachine

I played a lot of Warmachine – usually hitting up the game store once a week or more to get a few games in.  I started my Cygnar when Escalation came around and played through into Mark 2.  There were a lot of issues with the rules – none that made the game impossible to play, but certainly fiddly ones that made the game a little off if you didn’t keep up with the rule changes on the forums.  These rules problems didn’t come up every game, but they came up frequently enough.

Mark 2’s open beta came up and I gave the game a good go.  I tested, enjoyed what I was testing a bit, but I didn’t quite feel like the game was what I enjoyed playing.  It all felt a bit off.  The game size was increasing drastically, and what I enjoyed in Cygnar – playing a melee-based army – was becoming less viable.

I ended up leaving the game behind shortly after Warmachine Mark 2 was officially launched and drifted for a while before finding my next miniatures game.

Malifaux

I ended up picking up Malifaux probably six months after it was launched at GenCon.  I played through with Neverborn through the first couple books, then spread into Ressers when I saw Avatar Seamus in the third book, and picked up Guild with the arrival of McHammish in the fourth book.

I love Classic Malifaux, but I also recognize there were certainly places the game could be polished.  Playing casually was okay, but every few games you’d run into a rules interaction that required a lot of head-scratching or a run to the rules forum to determine.  Sometimes those expanded into questions about “Attack” versus “attack” or “Damage” versus “Wounds”.

When M2E was announced, I had a number of thoughts of what I’d like to see changed.  When I got my first chance to see it, a lot more had changed than I expected.  Similar to my reaction with Warmachine, I was initially put off by all the changes.  I don’t like a lot of change personally.  I had immediate flashbacks to how I went through the Warmachine Mark 2 test and the end results.  I prepared myself for the worst.

But my experiences with Warmachine had also helped to prepare me mentally for the changes.  I had been through the loss of a game that I considered my primary game before, and come out okay at the other end.  Second Generation Awesome Dan once called me pessimistic because I said that I expected there would be a time where I didn’t play Malifaux anymore.  The same thing had happened with Warmachine, after all.  Through that lens, it was easier to deal with.

Add to that the fact that Wyrd was giving me an opportunity to influence how the game would end up.  I made a deal with myself: I would not drop out of the playtesting until it was done.  I would endure the bad parts of the game and work to make them better.  I would put in more effort to put the game on what I felt was the right track now because it could influence the game for an entire new edition.  After all, I reasoned, if I dropped out of playtesting, or if I complained loudly but without substance, I had only myself to blame if the game did not come out well at the end of the tunnel.  Wyrd was giving me the opportunity to make recommendations.  Wyrd had demonstrated they would listen to us.  If at release the game was still not something I wanted to play, I would leave it behind and move on to the next game.  But if they moved it to something I enjoyed, I would have (at least in my mind) made the game into something I would enjoy for years to come.

With that philosophy, I went back into the game and tested the heck out of it.  Some things worked.  Some didn’t.  Sometimes they listened to me.  Sometimes they ignored me.  Sometimes I was on the majority side clamoring for a change or to maintain the status quo.  Sometimes I felt like a lone voice.  But whatever came up, I tried to remove all emotion from the post and present a sound and logical rational for the issue.

And you know what?  The game did change.  Slowly at first, but every iteration moved the game closer and closer to a system that I enjoy to the point where now I have a hard time finding a compelling reason (other than all the models not being available yet… an issue to be resolved before the year is out) to go back to v1.

Things could still prove to come out wrong at the end, I fully recognize that.  I’m still holding myself to the same deal I made when I was on the other end of the “excitement for M2E” spectrum.  I will not make my final decision until I see the final product.  But the way things are looking right now, I’m quite excited for the release at GenCon.

To those who are disappointed in M2E, I am not discounting your opinions.  If my experiences with WM gave me any lesson, it’s this: every game is not for every player.  I immensely enjoyed the first version of Warmachine.  I did not enjoy the second one.  But I can’t with a straight-face say it’s a bad system.  If anything, I have a hard time arguing that it’s not a better system now than it was before.  The game is more popular than it ever has been.  But at the same time, it’s not the game for me anymore.

M2E is still in a stage where it can change.  If you do not like something about the game, now is the time to try to make changes.  Already with the first wave of changes in open beta, a lot has seen adjustment.  It’s clear they are listening to us.  Take heart in that.

But if the game ends up being something that you don’t want to play anymore on the other end of release, that’s okay too.  I don’t look back at Warmachine with anger for them changing the game.  I remember the years of enjoyment I got out of it when I was playing.  I hope that people who leave Malifaux after v1 will look back the same way.

Malifaux M2E - Thoughts on the Core Rules

Malifaux 2nd edition (M2E) has been released to the public.  I figured I’d give some of my thoughts on it.  It seems the thing to do these days.

Before I start, I want to give you a little background.  I was in the beta test.  I know for some people that means an immediate dismissal of my opinions, and that’s fine.  I’m just a guy typing words into a computer – my opinion should always be taken with a grain of salt.  (Though if you want the correct opinion, just follow my lead.)

When I first saw M2E, I remember having a number of feelings, most of them pretty negative.  Early on, I actually put up a long post about how I felt the game had lost everything that made me enjoy Malifaux.  I didn’t enjoy the models, I didn’t enjoy the strategies, and I thought the rules were clunky.

 

In the months since then, my opinion has completely shifted to the point where even if I cannot be sure whether I will enjoy M2E as much as I did v1, I can say with certainty that I think the new core rules are better.

I have a lot to say about the game, but I thought a good place to start was for me to evaluate what I wanted to see change (as seen back in this post) and how that compared with what did end up changing after all.

Drain Souls

What I wanted:  I wanted this to remain in the game but changed in such a way that when it was used, models could still get points for strategies and schemes.    

What happened:  It is gone.  Flat out gone.  No need to worry about odd rules interactions because they don’t exist anymore.

Result: I am happy with this change.  I would have preferred keeping it but changing how it works, but eliminating it entirely removes the headache forever.

Strategies / Schemes

What I wanted:  I wanted them reworked – there were a number of issues with them.  Repeated schemes.  They favored speed over others.  Too many kill strategies and schemes.  A few schemes that were impossible to stop.  And faction schemes that were imbalanced (Archanist and Neverborn, mostly).  I wanted all of this fixed.

What happened:  They certainly did get reworked, more than I was expecting.  Schemes are more important.  Scheme pools.  Scheme markers.  No more faction schemes at all.  Time will tell whether I end up thinking there’s more variation in the schemes, but it’s looking pretty positive to me.

Result:  Improvement across the board.

 

Terrifying / Non-Living Models

What I wanted:  I wanted the result of terrifying to be weakened and the amount of terrifying to increase, essentially.

What happened:  Basically exactly that.  Fall back was removed and Terrifying either ends your current activation (if you’re in the middle of your activation) or gives you Paralyze (if it happens outside your activation).  Also, Terrifying picks a certain type of model to work against.

Result:  Hit right on what I wanted.

Pre-measuring

What I wanted:  Pre-measuring.

What happened:  Pre-measuring.

Result:  Flat out success.

Loaded Keywords

What I wanted:  There were a lot of similar rules that all piled around.  Fly and Float.  Pitiful, Harmless and Irrisistable.  Arachnid, Shambling and Scout.  I wanted them all combined so the bits about why one was better than another in what situation was removed.

What happened:  Pretty much exactly that.  Most similar rules got combined together.

Result:  Success.

Clean Up Confusing Rules

What I wanted:  A lot of the confusing rules were annoying to deal with.  Towards and Directly Towards.  Calculating range when height was involved.  A big one I missed in my first write-up was Effects – what are they.  Capital-A Attack versus lower-case-a attack.

What happened:  Some of these were addressed.  Effects got changed to Conditions, which was a fantastic shift.  Line of Sight I know is still a little wonky.  There is still some room for improvement here, but they feel clearer to me now than v1 did.  Whether a few years of kicking the tires is going to shake out more weird rules interactions or not only time can tell.  I tend to think there will be, but that’s only because I have yet to find a game that doesn’t end up with some weirdness after any given length of time.

Result:  Partial success, but still room to improve.

So there we have it.  So far it’s actually looking pretty solid compared with my initial hopes for the game.  I was trying to pin down why I liked the game so much, and being able to look back at a recorded set of issues I had with the game and see how many of them were specifically addressed with the new edition, I guess it makes a lot of sense.

And that’s not even getting into the changes that happened that I wasn’t actually looking for.

Upgrades – Okay, now this one I’m actually not completely on board with.  Conceptually I can see the plan, but all things being equal, I would rather play a game without Upgrades than with.  They just don’t fit my style as well.  But if they’re the major disappointment to me from M2E, I’ll call that a good day.

Scheme Markers – Now these are fantastic.  I love this idea.  It makes schemes feel much more dynamic to me.  Making a standard interact to work with all schemes means that schemes can be achieved while still keeping them hidden.  You can achieve a scheme while your opponent doesn’t know what you’re doing.  You can lay traps for your opponent with them by either encouraging him to go after them or by making it look like you’re doing one thing to pull him out of position while you move off to do something else.  Overall, a fantastic change and probably my second favorite in the new version.

Scheme Pool – I did not like this at all when I first saw it.  I thought it was over-complicated, useless, and severely limited my ability to play the game I wanted to play.  Then I used the scheme pool for a half dozen games or so.  Now I love it.  With 19 schemes available, if I had full choice of all schemes, I would easily slip back into the v1 pattern of “choose two of these five schemes I know how to do very well every game”.  Now I can’t.  The schemes I might know well may not be available for every game.  It keeps the missions feeling fresh and varied.

Soulstones – This is a change that I can understand the two sides.  I love that soulstones have more uses but are weaker than they used to be.  In the past, they turned your master into an amazing beast that could do what it wanted to any non-soulstone users.  Now, not so much anymore.  Soulstone users still have some real solid benefits with auto-suits and with prevention flips, but they can’t get to the point where they’re automatically succeeding at what they want.

One other thing about soulstones I disliked from v1 was when you sent a soulstone user at another soulstone user.  Both players would generally have the cheat, and then both would spend a soulstone, and the entire duel came down to who flipped better on the random single card.  Now that’s gone, and the emphasis is on who has the higher cheat and stat.  The way I think it should be.

Five-turn Limit – This came across to me the same way the Scheme Pool initially did.  And then something crazy happened.  I played with the five-turn limit and the game actually felt okay.  I tried it again and strangely, I liked it.  I played again and again and again and soon I came to the realization that it wasn’t a fluke.  I loved five-turn games.  So much, in fact, that I wish v1 had only been five turns.  This is, hands down, my favorite change to the v2 core rules.

Why do I like five-turn games?  In v1, my games often went like this: I would move out, ambush and kill all my opponents’ models, then grab my schemes and/or strategy.  I would usually be able to wipe out most of my opponents’ crew by turn 4 or so, so that gave me 2 turns to collect my points.  Piece of cake.

Now if I try that, I am killing my opponent’s crew by turn 4 or so, and I run out of time to collect my points.  I’ve played games where one person went all-out for their points and the other went for killing, then tried to grab their points, and they lost because they ran out of time.  One of the things I’ve seen pointed to as a reason why Malifaux was so cool – that you could win a game while still being wiped out – is now more feasible.  I think I had done that maybe a handful of times in v1.  In v2, if you play smart and grab your VPs as fast as possible, you can do that more often when your opponent doesn’t try to grab theirs.

So there we have it.  My first article on M2E.  I’m certainly a fan of the new version of Malifaux and am enjoying getting it out to the larger audience.  It took me a while to get to the point where I could say that, but I think the game that’s out is a very fine product, and now hopefully we’ll be able to get the balance of the models to a solid state before it’s all locked down.

Thanks to everyone who is out there working hard at testing the models.  The best way to learn the game is by playing it, and the best way to find the problems with it is by putting them on the table.  Not once, not twice, but a lot.  Hundreds upon hundreds of games have already been played in the closed beta to get the game where it is now.  Let’s get thousands more through these next weeks to get the game to an awesome product.