Gremlin dissection: Pere Ravage

In the next dissection of the gremlin crew we have Pere Ravage. He’s the “heavy blast and pulse dealer” gremlin in the La Croix family.

The stats

He also has an average statline with the exception of his low WP. He is a cost of 6 and has 7 wounds. It’s pretty good, because you are going to try to be a deterrent to your opponent and for 6 points that’s a good deterrent in my eyes.

The skills

He has the ability Reckless which gives him an additional AP at the start of the turn. This will cost him 1 wound.

He has explosive demise 4 so everything around him in 2’’ range gets 4 damage when this model is killed (and not sacrificed, which means that he only explodes when he is reduced to 0 wounds) This can come in handy when he gets stuck into Ml and then you can try to shoot him. If you hit this model then you can potentially kill more models than you could normally. This makes an excellent piece to drop into the enemy lines and be a nuisance to deal with without losing a lot pieces in the process.

The last ability he has is Squeel, which is a defensive trigger and needs a mask. You can push away 4’’from a Ml Attack after you received damage. You can potentially stop a second attack on a charger or stop a Flurry action.

The actions

He has 2 attack actions: Burn Stick and Breathe Fire.

The Burn Stick has a rg of 1 and a Ml of 5. it does blast damage on medium and double blast on severe damage. on a ram he gets critical stike, which give +1 damage for every ram in the total.

The Breathe Fire attack has a rg of 8 and Sh of 5, which is fairly average. In all honesty, I’ve never have used this attack during my games. It has a lower damage output than the mL attack, but the same blasts apply here. On ram though it does triple damage. The downside is that you have to sacrifice the model, so his explosive demise doesn’t work.

He also has a tactical action Oopsie!.

This has a casting and a TN of 10 and a tome, which is a bit more difficult to get since you can’t use soulstones. The action lets everybody in a pulse of 6 make a TN Df 13 duel or suffer 5 damage. You can do this action 2 times of you want. And with a reckless action you can move up and do this action twice. Your model is killed afterwards of course, but you get an explosive demise of because he was killed and not sacrificed.

The tricks

The only upgrade I would consider is team work. Not for the innate ability to make you Ht 2, but for the 1 action, which places this model in bas contact with an enemy model and makes you push your other gremlin model out of harms way. That way the regular harmless bayou gremlin for example can become this exploding gremlin which can cause a lot of serious damage in your enemies crew.

The looks

I like the new model. It’s quite quirky and gives the gremlins back some of the random silly-ness that the new art is missing a bit in my eyes. I’ll definitely get the new model once it comes out and perhaps use this new model instead of the old model (when it is released).

The playbook

This model is there to do 1 thing. It needs to explode and take other models with it. It’s not a good model in reckoning, but in the other strategies it can become a board control character.

You can use him in different ways because of the blast damage and the pulse damage. You just need to kill him yourself or let him be killed by your opponent. Otherwise you do’t get the full potential out of this model.

Now to get it into enemy lines you can do a few things.

One, do the reckless ability and walk him up 15’

Two, toss him with Lenny. You become insignificant, but that’s not why this model is on the table. You can even deal some more damage with this toss if you push him against another model.

Three, you can launch him with the pigapult anywhere within 24’. You can drop a bomb in the enemy line and normally you out activate your opponent so your paralyze usually isn’t an issue. Just wait until your opponent is done with his activations and then launch Pere. Then let him activate and lose his paralyze. Next turn he is ready to wreak havoc.

Four, if you play with Ophelia you can push him into base contact with here and then move him further. This gives you an extra moveboost.

Five, the upgrade team work can move him into enemy lines and get your own models out of harms way.

Gremlin dissection: Raphael Lacroix

In the next dissection of the gremlin crew we have Raphael Lacroix. He’s the “heavy damage absorption” gremlin in the LaCroix family.

The stats

He has some average stats and the only thing that springs out is his CG of 8. He’s also a height of 1.

The skills

He has the ability Reckless which gives him an additional AP at the start of the turn. This will cost him 1 wound.

He has fueled by panic ,which is an interesting ability. as long as he as 4 WD or less he gets a [+] to damage flips and gets no damage from the reckless ability.

He has hard to kill, which means you first have to bring him down to 1 WD. then you need another attack to kill him. So even if you do 15 damage, you can only get him to 1 WD first and then you need to spend another AP to kill him with an attack or spell. This is a nice ability to have.

He also has Armor +1 which reduces damage by 1 to a minimum of 1.

All this helps him survive a little longer and he gets a little better if he is down on wounds.

The actions

He has 2 attack actions: Big Honkin’ Stock and Big Honkin’ Gun.

The Stick has a Ml of 3 and does low damage. It also has the Dumb luck trigger, so that’s quite good.

The gun is a bit better with a Sh of 5 and a range of 10. He does average damage and also has the dumb luck trigger, so that’s better and he has hard to kill so he won’t kill himself by accident.

He also has a tactical action as a (1) action which lets you push up to 4’’ away in any direction, but you have to be engaged to use it, so that’s pretty average since I always want to be in combat with him except if he has only 1 wound left.

The tricks

If there is one upgrade I would give him it would be team work. It allows you to place (important) him into combat and push some other gremlin away from combat. You can potentially protect a vital piece and be a tarpit for the model he will be engaged with.

The looks

I like the previous model better than this one. It had some more quirkiness to it and it had a bit more character to it. It looked a bit more like its counterpart in my opinion. So I will be sticking with my old model for now.

The playbook

In my eyes he plays like a tarpit model. He can stay around for that little bit longer than usual. If you’re lucky you can even heal him up again once he’s down to 1 wound. You can also use him a bodyguard scheme perhaps since he has hard to kill. Besides that he’s an average looking model in my eyes and I don’t use him that much in the current games I’ve been playing.

Gremlin dissection: Rami Lacroix

In the next dissection of the gremlin crew we have Rami Lacroix. He’s the long range sniper wielding gremlin in the La Croix family.

The stats

He has a DF and a Wp of 4. He has 6 Wd and a Wk of 5. He has no Cg (not that you want to charge with him) and a Ht of 1. He’s an Enforcer, living and rare 1 characteristic. He is also a gremlin and a kin model.

The skills

He has the ability Reckless which gives him an additional AP at the start of the turn. This will cost him 1 wound.

He also has the defensive trigger “Squeel!”. You can get yourself out of combat if you have a mask in your hand. Although he only has 6 wounds so a hit or 2 will kill him. This can help with his survivability.

He also has the ability Aim High, which gives him the ability to target HT 2 models without penalty. So it’s great to use to shoot into combat. Add this with the great range and he can do that extra damage you need to kill off the enemy.

The actions

He only has 2 actions. A shooting attack and a tactical action.

The shooting attack has a range of 18!!! and can be doubled using the focus action.

It has one trigger which doubles the damage, but with low wounds it’s better not to use this action a lot. It has an average damage spread so great to pick off weakened models.

The tactical action is cast that makes a healing flip. It’s pretty ok for a (1) action.

The tricks

There are not a lot of upgrades he can take that are worth while.

These are 2 I could take if I have some points to spare:

Stilts can be nice for the additional height, so you can look over small walls and fences and the like. Also the damage prevention  from 1 ML attack can be nice to buy yourself more time. Although it doesn’t work with the squeal trigger so you have to watch out.

Another one : gremlin see will give you an option to remove conditions and you can use a (0) action for it. You don’t have any other (0) actions so this might be something to consider.

The looks

I like the looks, but my preference goes out to the previous model. It’s really a question of taste really.

The playbook

This model is a defensive model in my eyes. So try to keep it back a bit more than the rest. I have the tendency to chuck it forward and do a lot of damage early, but I think he is more of a control piece that should be treated as such. Try to get a good vantage point and stay there. Also he can help out in schemes where the opponent needs to get into your deployment zone. He can be a deterrent for that as well.

Besides that he’s a bit one dimensional. Shoot and then shoot some more. He doesn’t have unimpeded or the hunter ability like he used to have so he became a lot weaker than before.

Gremlin dissection: The young Lacroix

In the third dissection of the gremlin crew we have the young Lacroix. They are the small “up and comers “ in the family and they are the totems of Lacroix. They have a supporting role in handing out upgrades to Ophelia and getting yourself some cheap models to help you out activate your opponent.

The stats

The young have a cost of 2 and have the Peon, Living and totem (Lacroix) characteristic. They are also gremlin and they are kin, which lets you target them with the abilities that Ophelia has.

They have a Df of 5, Wp and Wd of 3. They have a Wk of 6, which is pretty fast, and no charge. They are also Ht 1.

The skills

They have 4 abilities: Gets Into Everything, Role Model, Insignificant, Small Target

The first one is Gets Into Everything. You get to make an Attack action that’s printed on Ophelia’s gun upgrades within 6’’ and you get a Sh -2 penalty. That’s pretty good especially with the threatening gun upgrades which lets you fire twice a turn. For the other guns you drop the upgrades, so you can only fire them once.

The next one ( Role Model) lets you hire 3 of these models instead of the normal 1. They are a great addition, but I might be getting 2 in the future instead of 3 to save some costs.

With the next one (Insignificant) you can’t take interact actions, so they can’t be used for objectives or schemes that requires you to take interaction actions.

The last one (Small Target)  gives the attacker a [-] to hit you with shooting attacks. This helps them to survive  a little longer, but they are still fairly easy to kill.

The attacks

They have 2  actions they can do.

The first one is a shooting attack: the Much Abused Pistol. It deals 1/3/4 damage and has the trigger Dumb Luck, which lets you double the damage and you suffer half the amount of damage a s well. The trigger isn’t that useful, because when you do moderate damage, you kill yourself as well. To do severe damage is not that likely either, since you need to have a bit of luck to get that severe off.

The next one is a tactical action “Here You Go!”. It lets you attach one of Ophelia’s gun upgrades to her. It effectively let her use upgrades without spending the additional soulstones to take them in the first place; also Ophelia can use other AP instead of wasting an AP to get the gun she needs.

They are totems, so they can’t take upgrades. What you see is what you get.

The looks

We only have one picture for the 3 models so that’s a bit disappointing. The old models look really nice and they have a nice flavor so I recommend the old models while you wait for a new release.

The playbook

Keep them out of harms way, because they are fairly easy to kill with 3 wounds. Try to use cover and other intervening models as your advantage. They already get a bonus with their tiny-ability, so every bonus will help. You’ll probably struggle with the reckoning strategy, so I tend to experiment with1 or 2 Young ones.

I tend to place them behind Ophelia, except if I want to shoot something, then I try to place them parallel to Ophelia.

Another use for the young Lacroix is, in later game turns, use them to stop other models from moving, by engaging them in close combat. In the later turns you can make sure that your opponent’s models have to deal with these small nuisances instead of focusing on completing schemes and strategies. In that way they serve another purpose instead of handing out upgrades to Ophelia. And if you use defensive stance on them they can tie models up for multiple turns (if you’re lucky that is)

Gremlin dissection: Francois Lacroix

In the second dissection of the gremlin crew we have Francois Lacroix. He’s the only henchmen in the La Croix family so he’s the second on my list.

The stats

He is a cost of 7 and has a cache of 6. Which means that when he leads a crew in smaller games he gets 6 soulstones from the start. He has the living, rare 1 and henchman characteristic. He also is a gremlin and he’s kin, which ties in with Ophelia’s  abilities.

He has a DF of 4, which is average for a gremlin. He has WP 7 and that’s a very good stat. He has 10Wd which is also good. A Wk of 5 and a CG of 6. He’s also HT 1. Overall he’s pretty decent statwise. He is not too high costing and he can use soulstones, which gives him some more survivability and he can use his tricks a little bit better.

The skills

He has companion, which lets you activate after a friendly model ended it’s activation within 6’’. It’s handy to have especially when you need to do some extra damage to a model before it activates.

He also has the ability Reckless, which gives him an additional AP at the cost of one extra WD. It gives him the ability to do some additional shooting or perform an interact or something else. You have to plan it out though, because you can only do this at the start of this model’s  activation.

The last ability he has is Squeal, which is a defensive trigger and needs a mask. You can push away 4’’from a Ml Attack after you received damage. You can potentially stop a second attack on a charger or stop a Flurry action. You can cheat in the mask with the use soulstone ability.

The actions

He has 2 Attack actions. He has the Dueling Sword and the “Rough rider” Attack.

The Dueling Sword is a ML of 6 and a ram. It has a Rg of 2. It does 2/3/5 damag and can be doubled with the Dumb luck trigger, which is already build in. The downside to the trigger is that you receive half the damage you do when you declare the trigger. The use soulstone ability can help you to prevent some of the damage you do. All in all this is a great attack and can be intimidating with the potentional to do 10 damage in one swing.

The “Rough rider”   shooting attack is a 5 and a mask and has a range of 10. It does 2/3/4 damage and has two triggers. On a ram you do the Dumb luck trigger, same like the Dueling Sword.

 The other trigger is on a crow( Loose Trigger) which let you make the same Attack action again. You have to damage your enemy and it will cost you one wound. Again, you can cheat in the crow with the use soulstone ability.

He also has a casting action (Gremlin Menace) with a Rg of 6. You can push 5’’ toward a model. Your targets a condition which gives him [-] to attack actions when targeting Francois.

He also has a (0) action (Showdown)  which is also a ca of 5. You need a TN 10and a tome. When it succeeds you can discard cards to gain a [+] for that duel.

The tricks

Out of all the upgrades I would choose dirty cheater. It gives him some more survivability and combine that with the damage prevention from the use soulstone ability and you can potentially let him hang around the board a little bit longer.

The upgrade team work is an ability that lets you place this model into contact and then push another model out of harms way.

If Francois is your leader and you are playing against something like Pandora, you can use liquid bravery to give yourself and models around you a boost to their WP. This combined with the high WP makes him a good candidate to take this upgrade.

The looks

He has the same feel and abilities from 1.5. he looks the same as well with the cigarette in mouth. I like this look and maybe get him when the new box comes out.

If you need a good support piece for the Ophellia crew or another gremlin master, I think Francois is the gremlin you need. He has a lot of damage potential and some movement tricks as well (via upgrades that is).

The playbook

I use him primarily as a potential threat and damage dealer. With his loose trigger skill he can dish out a lot of damage if you have some high cards in hand and some soulstones to burn. You can get around the board fairly quickly and has some nice synergies with other models in this Ophelia crew.

With the current schemes you can use him as a Scheme marker – dropper. Or, when you have the scheme frame for murder,  start the game aggressively and then kill a model. You can bait your opponent in killing your model and because he’s a henchmen you’ll get  3 VP.

So I’ll play him aggressively and in that way your opponent has to divide his attention between Ophelia and him. Two great shooters are better than one.

Link to the artwork: http://coolspyro17.deviantart.com/art/Day-72-Dissection-348092579