Hands down star of the show so far has been Shikome – fast movement, solid on offense with some nice tricks and triggers, plus manages to hold on when attacked (if not just summon a new one!).
Datsu-ba on the other hand is yet to find her place. I've read a lot of blogs/forums with people raving about her so I'm probably not seeing it yet. She has a lot of potential so I'm loathed to drop her from the starting lineup (plus I can't summon her in). After a few days of contemplation I've decided to try something a little different for her.
In the opening turn or two I've been activating and passing (usually) with my Seishin and totem to out activate Fug, and then summon all the big hitters in at the end of turn knowing there are no reprisals to come this turn. Datsu usually spends this time lounging around with not much to do, so I've decided to give her a job.
Based upon a trick for Sonnia Criid that I learned from Bill at Dead Tau Project – using Desperate Mecenaries in your starting lineup to then kill and summon more expensive Witchling Stalkers – I'm going to drop a Seishin from the starting list and replace with a Desperate Merc (same points cost).
On turn one Datsu goes to town on the Merc and finishes him off with her funky spell that (if it kills the target) turns them into a Gaki or even an Onryo with the trigger. Making sure this happens within 8" of Kirai means that I lose a Merc, gets turned into a Gaki with a corpse counter in the pocket, and Kirai gains Seishin number 5. This basically means I get two (low priced) models for the price of one and will take my crew count up to 10 before summoning Ikiryo or Shikome.
I also intend including The Hanged for the first time to see what he can do. I may take some photos this week, although I warn you now there are no painted models…yet.
Got one game in borrowing Dan's crew. Datsu-be worked really well for me in the early game, making more Gaki out of a dog and a Desperate Merc. After that, she didn't do a ton. The big advantage was that she was a spirit with a ton of wounds. I've seen Dan use her by throwing her out, then when she was getting low on wounds, yanking her back to Kirai by swapping places and healing her back up.
ReplyDeleteActually I re-listened to an older Gamers Lounge episode where Dan talked about Ressers and Kirai in particular. I have tried the swirling thing in last week's game, and the theory is great. I just need to implement it consistently.
ReplyDeleteI've also been using Seishin to Empower (2 action) nearby Spirits instead of just passing, giving them +2CB which boosts the humble Onryo nicely.
Interesting idea for desperate mercenaries, I'm gonna have to pass that one along!
ReplyDeleteThe Merc trick became my standard opening turn with Sonnia and meant I got 8ss worth of models for the cost of 4ss. It does hamstring Sonnia a little in turn 1, but boosts your lineup.
ReplyDeleteI tried it this evening (to a lesser extent) with Kirai and it worked ok with the Gaki. Had Datsu-Ba got her trigger and summoned an Onryo instead it would definitely be worth it.
However, the cards deserted me this evening and I got hammered by Lilith so not feeling overly positive about the game.
Forgot to mention, the trick in full with Sonnia is to cast (0)Inferno in turn 1, making sure the 2 Mercs are next to her at the end of the turn to take 3 wounds each.
ReplyDeleteIn turn 2 she then casts (1) Violation of Magic on each of them in turn, killing them and thus turning them into Witchlings.