Death From Above: The Minuteman

[leo_neil316]

I
Weapons
The Slug Gun can be described as ?anemic? for range: 4?. That goes beyond up close and personal in game terms and suicidal as far as most light jacks are concerned. However, these aren?t your typical Cygnarian POW 10 infantry shooters, or even the Charger?s POW 12: These short-range cannons come in at a respectable POW 14?and it has two of them. Devastating to anything less than ARM 15, and effective up to 16, you begin to see diminishing returns at any level beyond ARM 16.

Dude, your math is off.

Against ARM 20 you're looking at 2 damage unboosted and 6 to 8 damage boosted. Against ARM 18 you'll get 6 damage a round unboosted and 12 to 14 damage boosted.

A hunter gets you 3 damage unboosted vs ARM 20 and 6 or 7 boosted. Against ARM 18 you get 4 damage unboosted and 7 to 8 damage boosted.

That's not really diminishing returns. Sure it's more focus intensive. But a pair of minutemen can utterly waste some heavies in a single turn.

[gelfy]

That's not really diminishing returns. Sure it's more focus intensive. But a pair of minutemen can utterly waste some heavies in a single turn.

for 5 points it really doesnt matter. but i cant see 2 taking a heavy down without some nuts rolling.

[ZeeWulf]

Dude, your math is off.

Against ARM 20 you're looking at 2 damage unboosted and 6 to 8 damage boosted. Against ARM 18 you'll get 6 damage a round unboosted and 12 to 14 damage boosted.

A hunter gets you 3 damage unboosted vs ARM 20 and 6 or 7 boosted. Against ARM 18 you get 4 damage unboosted and 7 to 8 damage boosted.

That's not really diminishing returns. Sure it's more focus intensive. But a pair of minutemen can utterly waste some heavies in a single turn.

You're right, my math is actually very conservative. And in a perfect theory machine world I would quite happily yield to your assessment. However in practice things can and will be wildly different. The point I am making is that if you're depending upon our friend to do your heavy lifting you will be sorely disappointed. Sometimes it will perform and sometimes it will fail miserably.

I would also point out that you are achieving near parity with the hunter using 10 points of model and 4 points of focus...vs the hunter's 6 points and single focus. We have better tools than that kind of trade off.

[TimBuckToo]

My understanding has it you can jump after a successful charge.

That would be awesome but "A model making a Full Advance advances up to its current speed (SPD) in inches." Someone please prove me wrong but unless Bounding Leap has been Infernaled, you can't charge and jump. Same reason why a Totem Hunter can't 8-(

[Ysthrall]

Damn it, I just played the Minuteman under Kraye and put Full Tilt on the Centurion reflexivley. Because you can still use flak field under full tilt, and I eventually got shot up by MHSF

In a previous game, it got battered by the Blessing of Vengeance. I don't like that jack...

Still testing mine out though, more data needed

[bittersweetwv]

So reading the blurb AND looking at the range of the guns, why the Devil hasn't it got "Gunfighter"?

I agree needs gunfighter and where is the wxtended range cortex the Hunter has?

[Xnath]

The pretty much should of sold these in packs of 2... heh

[Ysthrall]

Played another game with mine today, vs Menoth. Yes, Gunfighter would be useful, but it does seem to be a jack for shredding light support primarily, and using those guns only if the opportunity arises. Mine walked up to a Vanquisher and Reckoner, jumped over their heads, and flak fielded to kill mechanic and 3/4 choir. Engaged and mangled by Kreoss, it nevertheless held on for another turn to flak field a wrack.... which exploded, killing the last of the choir and the Minuteman. Worked a bit better there

Extended control range on this guy would be broken. His major weakness is his habit of operating at the edge, if not beyond, your control zone. His DEF is good, his ARM we can mitigate, his stats are good, his weapons are good (as long as you don't plan on killing things with his fists) and his special abilities are exemplary. For 5 points, he's a bargain, and one I just wish would survive a little longer. Give him extended control range OR gunfighter and he'd be cheap at 6 points. Give him both and he'd be cheap at 7.

He's good.

[Wanderingalleycat]

If only you could use one in a Sloan and Kraye ally game list.

Full tilt + Refuge + Leap + Cav movement. 34 inchs of movement.

[chimpeau]

Even if you could both full tilt and refuge, that's only 27 inches.

[Varius]

Even if you could both full tilt and refuge, that's only 27 inches.

12 Full advance + 5 leap + 12 refuge advance + 5 light cav move = 34

Add in the advance deploy that is some serious board coverage.


Where did you get 27?

[tankrandall]

amazing writeup spud!

[tankrandall]

I like the "jump behind a heavy jack then lock both its arms" idea. Focus intensive though at 3 for the first turn and 2 for each turn after that but a good way to take that heavy out of the fight. Assuiming your opponent hasnt got something that can easily kill the minuteman.

You cannot lock both arms with one jack, while engaged in a lock you cannot perform power attacks such as a lock.

[MollyHatchet]

Only need to lock one arm anyway, so a bit of a moot point.

Whatever it is, its still locked, and not doing a whole lot.

[Adept Rahn]

I really like this model both in looks but gaming terms hes great!
I have given him ago with a few casters and i must say Kara sloan loves him
feat turn and 3 focus and the refuge on top of this make him very dangerous and flexible.
pNemo over charging this with locomotion makes this thing very good but that is
if you have taken a few tokens to get 8 focus.
3 + 6 +5 and then 4 for guns is a nice threat range, plus electrify on him stops infantry
from considering killing him as pow 14 will most likely kill them in return.
Heck i even had a laugh and used it as eHaley bonded jack and lets say turn 2 was interesting
spd 8 + 2 for temp accelaration and telekenisis caster to face the other way and this thing
went 10 move and 5 jump and 3 power 14 guns in the back does the trick on the middle arm casters.
Granted it costs a full 9 focus with taking 1 from the squire.
I think our enemies will after start to defend from them once they get used to facing them, even so
its not easy to do due to there flexibility.

[ShoX]

I'm planning to get a few points of Cygnar to have a hordes and a warmachine faction, and if pCaine's Tier hadn't already put me in Cygnar, this guy definately would have sealed the deal. He can flakfield a screening unit, jump behind a heavy, lock its shield and then have it charged for 10+4D6 by swordknights. Even if you lose the entire module, that should definately take out the 9pts of army you just invested. Everything that survives should be cherry on top. He should be amazing with eHaley. If your opponent has a lot of melee in the back, he either has to let him be or engage with his stuff which then gets flaked. He will likely keep me theorycrafting for weeks.

[chimpeau]

12 Full advance + 5 leap + 12 refuge advance + 5 light cav move = 34

Add in the advance deploy that is some serious board coverage.


Where did you get 27?

First off, refuge and full tilt are both upkeeps. Also, full tilt only applies to in activation, normal movement. So even in the hypothetical doubleupkeep scenario, you only get 12+5+6+5 = 28.

I am also terrible at arithmetic.

[Wanderingalleycat]

Ahh, foiled by logic yet again. ah well. Its been a bit since I played sloan (was practicing with pNemo) and so had forgotten it was an upkeep.

The raw hilarity of a minuteman running up, and flak fielding all the druids on a control point at the bottom of turn 1 was beautiful. didn't work out quite as wonderfully as I hoped,but still quite nice.

[tankrandall]

I really like this model both in looks but gaming terms hes great!
I have given him ago with a few casters and i must say Kara sloan loves him
feat turn and 3 focus and the refuge on top of this make him very dangerous and flexible.

Refuge only allows the model to move after its combat actions ends so wouldn't you be better off with that 2 focus on Kara or another jack boosting damage? +D6 damage on two different attacks has to be worth more than 6 movement on a jack that wouldn't be able to get out of range any way.

[Wanderingalleycat]

You aren't getting it. Ok, let me put it in perspective. Minuteman moves forward 6" then jumps 5", flak fields, and shoots 6" away, then moves back 6" out of the way. It makes them work like they do for Kraye, but at slightly longer range thanks to fire group.

[tankrandall]

You aren't getting it. Ok, let me put it in perspective. Minuteman moves forward 6" then jumps 5", flak fields, and shoots 6" away, then moves back 6" out of the way. It makes them work like they do for Kraye, but at slightly longer range thanks to fire group.

OH I get it but blowing all your focus for the MM to go crazy seems a bit much, with that said I will more than likely try it out. I ordered Kara off ebay last night...I had some ebay bucks about to expire and one seller had her already $4 less than every one else (with shipping) so it was a no brainier, and I am going to pick the MM up at my local store to support them.

[Trollicious]

Refuge also only triggers when you hit something with an attack during your combat action. I do not believe flak field would count for this, so the MM has to shoot or punch something (and hit) after the jump or else it would be unable to refuge.

[Adept Rahn]

Refuge only allows the model to move after its combat actions ends so wouldn't you be better off with that 2 focus on Kara or another jack boosting damage? +D6 damage on two different attacks has to be worth more than 6 movement on a jack that wouldn't be able to get out of range any way.

I use him as assassination piece, so ploughing focus into him his fine
if I get the kill refuge is only there really if all goes bad for him.

[Rochr]

This is a great write up. After two 50p games with three minutemen (Siege + Kraye) I can easily say that I find them incredible fun to play and very effective. Right now I think that my two opponents lack of understanding the 'jack gives it a huge edge, in a few months when they realise they need to go deal with them I guess they will get scrapped a lot faster. First game against pSorcha I managed to 2-hand throw her two times, hilarious.

[Wanderingalleycat]

Yes, that is true about refuge. but you also get two shots with pow 14's. and if you put that two extra focus on, chances are good you will either be boosting to get a hit on your opponent with one of them or hitting a heavy target that will likely have crap for defense anyways.

[ZeeWulf]

The two extra focus would have been awesome on Tuesday night for me; I ended up whiffing the damage rolls on a Proteus for two out of four minuteman shots while the other two rolled below average. If I would have rolled average, it would have been dead, but instead, it ate both minutemen the next turn. (And then the next turn, with still only 8 boxes left on it, I ended up plinking it down to one box with Kraye, Rangers, Jr and Arlen--still rolling below average on nearly all rolls. Which forced me to waste a hunter shot on it. Laaaame.) That is yet another danger--if you don't manage to disable or kill your target, you're going to get mauled. Of course, it didn't help that Vayl managed to make both minutemen stationary...and then my ironclad the next turn....
And then rolled max damage on nearly every roll.
And then the game prior my Cryx opponent took a 7-jack mortenbra list vs my balanced Darius list...

It was just a baaaad night, I think.

[ZeeWulf]

Double post, I know, but I'd like to note that I've updated post number 2 with some Synergy. More to come!

[Dan from Chicago]

Got the double handed throw on a caster

[ZeeWulf]

Very nice! How'd it end?

[Dan from Chicago]

Threw Gareth into a Centurion. pCaine tried to finish him off, but it came down to the Centurion stabbing away

[Ysthrall]

I'm testing out an eNemo tier list for 50 pts. It has a fair amount of manouverability, and 6 (elite cadre) Stormcallers. It doesn't have a Minuteman, it has a Firefly instead. Given the amount of chaos that can be caused by Firefly and 6 Stormcallers, do you guys think it's worth swapping out the Firefly for the Minuteman?

Who'd get Fail Safe, Energiser, and a huge control range to bounce around in...

[bcantwell]

Anyone considered the Minuteman as an accomplice to Sword Knights. Seems like a MM jumping behind an enemy heavy and locking it (especially if a shield arm can be lacked) would open up that jack to lots of charges from a nearby Sword Knight unit. Since the MM is now behind the target, it confers all of the Flank goodness without getting in the way of the Knights.

[Griffin839]

Anyone considered the Minuteman as an accomplice to Sword Knights. Seems like a MM jumping behind an enemy heavy and locking it (especially if a shield arm can be lacked) would open up that jack to lots of charges from a nearby Sword Knight unit. Since the MM is now behind the target, it confers all of the Flank goodness without getting in the way of the Knights.

yes. 2 with estryker, positive charge them and then jump in melee range of what I want my sk to own.

[Nion]

Stormclad: The Stormclad wields a double-edged sword. The Minuteman can clear the road for the big beatstick, but the Stormclad runs the danger of damaging the Minuteman from Electro-leap. Use with caution.

Electro Leap is optional. No danger to the Minuteman unless you can't judge the closest model.

Arcane Tempest Gun Mages: Our most versatile shooting unit, the ATGMs make an excellent pairing with most of our options. Combined with The Dude (Their UA, for the uninitiated), they make a shooting Warjack into a frightening monster. Unfortunately, the Minuteman appears like it could use the Snipe runeshot to extend its range to 8? giving the Minuteman an effective threat of 19??if you can find a way to give it a real focus and keep it within the CMD distance of The Dude to get the runeshot. That said, it could act as a good cleanup tool and screener when the gunmages don?t finish off a target or infantry are coming to call and the Gunmages have a higher priority target.

Don't have to be within CMD to get Runeshot, just the Marshall bonuses.

[ZeeWulf]

Thanks Nion, I'll fix it later. Good catch! Bcantwell I was going to hit that in my next update.

[Wanderingalleycat]

ooooo...I think my list that has Arlan will have to have an ATGM marshalled minuteman.

[cannonball]

So Snipe for 8" Guns with Arlan giving a focus to jump back again?

[Wanderingalleycat]

That and it would make a pretty good anti infantry deterent for them too. and remember, this would give the minuteman a 19 inch threat range which is pretty damn significant.

[leo_neil316]

So Snipe for 8" Guns with Arlan giving a focus to jump back again?

Can't jump after shooting.

[MinaFangirlOfEverblight]

because it has flak field, bounding leap and 2 open fists. if it had gunfighter there'd be a serious issue for a 5 point light jack with at least 3 ways of dealing with b2b models and reached models in order to still get shots off. it's an amazing 5 point light. definitely something i want a couple of for my kara lists...