It’s not like I haven’t done any gaming these past couple of weeks. Working my way through Blue Prince. Got through the credits in Monster Hunter Wilds (about halfway through the main plot). Played a couple games on my Analogue Pocket. Finished up Shining Revelry on Pokemon TCG Pocket. Spent way too much time working on the lighting model for Sword for Hire. Ya know, stuff.
Anyway, a lot of time has been spent working on my 4th edition crew for my first match of the new edition tomorrow night.
I’ve been playing 3rd edition since I started playing the game last year. In that time, I chose a faction — Arcanists, a magic-based faction — and a keyword in it — FOUNDRY, using the magic of the forge to make living constructs. Later, I chose another keyword in Arcanists — DECEMBER, using the magic of the living spirit of winter itself to defeat their foes.
Well, in fourth edition, FOUNDRY gets kicked out of Arcanists into the Ten Thunders faction. Their leader, Mei Feng, was in both factions before, but in 4th edition, all masters with more than one faction had to make a choice, and Mei Feng went with the Chinese-themed Ten Thunders faction.
With the change in faction and keyword, Mei Feng lost a lot of members of her crew. Her chief enforcer, Mechanical Porkchop, went back home to the bayou. Sparks, her healer and buffer, same. Her totem, the Forgeling, is tied only to her no title version, so since I play her title version, I’m losing another condition and health healer.
The new DECEMBER crew isn’t released yet, so just dealing with FOUNDRY.
So, the fourth edition is streamlined. Instead of five rounds, games last four rounds. Schemes score right from the start, and after you score one, you choose another one. Usually if someone is behind in points, they get an advantage to help catch up if an opponent scores. Combat is faster. Models have few actions, and a lot of those actions are shunted off to “crew cards” that everyone on the team shares. The idea is to make Malifaux a game that is faster to play and more inviting to new players.
I sure am looking forward to games that takes less than three hours.
I’ll go over more of that after I play my first game.
A little bit about the new models I have been putting together:
Neil Henry: Basically John Henry’s brother — a hard drivin’, rock crushin’ man who died after winning a competition against a steam drill. But this is his brother, and he found himself going through the Breach into Malifaux, and now he’s on the team. He’s only the second Black model I’ve painted, the other being one of my two ice dancers for the December keyword. (Ice dancers no longer exist in the fourth edition, so changes are coming to December as well).
Willie: He likes to blows things up. He’s pushing a barrow full of dynamite into the mine and that barrow is gonna come back empty.
Shadow Effigy: That’s the girl from The Ring climbing out of the well. It’s an alternate “Guise and Goblins” version of the two point model that transforms into a monstrous Shadow Emissary, a dark dragon that I am still painting.
Shadow Emissary: When conditions are met (Shadow Effigy gets a hit on an enemy and spends two soul stones), Shadow Effigy is replaced by Shadow Emissary. I’m using my Arcane Emissary as proxy for the dragon because fuck you, Wyrd, I spent a lot of time painting it and I’m going to use it.
I don’t have the app. The crew cards are just stuff I printed out. The core mechanic of Foundry — Ride the Rails, a way of teleporting between scrap markers for amazing mobility — is gone for the title version of the model, and nerfed for the non-title version. I don’t have the Forgeling. Neil Henry and Willie were models I’d never bothered to paint or base because they were way overshadowed by Porkchop and Sparks.
More later. Tonight — tonight is Frosthaven, FINALLY. Mondays have been cursed for us, but I’m hoping it comes together tonight.
