Tale of Malifaux Bloggers: Molly and her Students

School is in session. For this months ToMB (May/June) I present one of the larger purchases for a Molly crew. In this month's purchase we take a look at the University of Transmortis box set. This box came out about 11-12 months ago, in 2013. It was a highly anticipated product at the time as it was our first chance to physically see what a Malifaux 2E stat card was made out of.  It also shipped with a number of M2E specific story missions.

There is a helpful review that decomposes the students (see what I did there) over at GMort_Chaotica's blog. If you're looking for great unboxing/reviews take a look at his stuff, its quite informative. One word of caution, when looking at the stat cards keep in mind that these cards are no longer legal stat cards. Even though they are M2E, they went through a re-work during the Wave2 open beta Wyrd ran at the beginning of 2014. This was done in order to bring their abilities/stats more in line with what M2E Wave 1 and Wave 2 models ended up being. This is understandable since this box went to print well before M2E was done. Make sure to grab them over at the Wyrd site before they go away when Wave 2 book/cards become available (that's when they'll be removed from the site; low-res, hi-res).

The models are all Iron Zombies and can be used in the story encounters (some of the rules are a little weird, but for a good 'ol fun game they're worth giving a try; there is also a 1-player mission). The rulebook for the story encounters comes with the box.

The box retails for $40, so we will be using the $14.51 + $25 from this month, so I'm short $0.49 which I'm just going to borrow from next month. I will have $24.51 for next month.  The following models/stat cards come in this box:

• The Valedictorian
• Student of Sinew
• Student of Steel
• Student of Viscera

Ok so on to the models, first off they're stunning. These are some of the most amazing and beautiful models Wyrd has produced. The Valedictorian is of course my favorite model, but all are in a league of their own, really showing what the transition to plastics has enabled from a modeling perspective.

I have had these fellas primed for about 9 months, and they are on the painting table, but other models are taking their slots in the queue for now. I'm hoping to get to them in the next month or so. Stay tuned for some painted Iron Zombies next month hopefully.

Before we jump into what each model does, let's review why they're good in a Molly crew and specifically why I use them in my crews. The simplest answer is that 3 of the 4 models can be summoned by Molly when taking the Forgotten Life upgrade card because they are Horror minions. The beauty of this is that each of the iron zombies / students are tailored to combat (exploit) specific model traits/characteristics.

All the iron zombies also have Flurry, which can be pre-loaded by using Molly's (0) Whispers of Future Flesh to have them move before activating and then when they activate they are in position to use their Flurry. All of the iron zombies also have Armor +1 as well as the Hard to Wound +1 and a (0) Lecture Notes to remove the ability for a model to take triggers. This is great against models with Squee or other triggers allowing them to move away.

So from a summoning standpoint you can summon the right model for the right job against the right enemy models. For a quick recap on what Molly can summon with this upgrade here are the card requirements to summon certain models (notice the students).

The student of Sinew and Steel require the same 11 crow that a Punk Zombie does but the Student of Viscera needs a 12 crow. The Sinew and Steel variants have the same stat lines but differ in that sinew is better suited against undead models, while steel is better suited against constructs. They have terrifying which targets undead/constructs, ignore hard to wound/armor and have triggers gaining ++ to damage flips against undead/constructs.

So lets take a quick look at the other models:

Valedictorian

• Key Remarks: 
• Henchman - Access to using soul stones to mitigate damage, valid Bodyguard and Entourage candidate (due to mobility from flight, armor, and hard to wound)
• 50mm base - This is often over looked but can really help. This coupled with the 3" Ml attack. Meaning getting and keeping models in engagement range is a little easier. Add in Unnerving Aura or Decaying Aura and she can put the hurt on. This also makes her a great model to help carry out Deliver a Message against an enemy master since she can get there and engage early to take the action next turn (or be moved by Molly/Necrotic Machine)
• Overall she is pretty resilient, and for 10ss a great Henchman to use in various situations. Give her a try and you'll be happy you did, just remember like any other model in Malifaux she has a specific purpose and should hired and used in specific roles

Student of Viscera

• Key Remarks:
• Slither - This ability alone makes this model worth the 12 crow needed to summon. Slither allows for a 9" movement (not a push) ignoring severe terrain. After moving the model can take a (1) Ml action. It is basically an alternative to a charge action. The charge of this model is 6" and because its a charge would suffer penalties due to terrain; so thats a 8" threat range. With (2) Slither the model gets 11" threat range. Now just remember if you summon this model you'll want to either remove the Slow condition (with someone like Chiaki or Johan) so it can use this ability the turn it is summoned
• 50mm base - As mentioned above this allows for a larger range of models it can hit. Just remember if summoned it can't take interact actions the turn it summons in. But a 50mm base model with 2" Ml attack doing 2/3/5 is pretty slick.

So that's it for this month. A quick overview of the models and why I think they're great for Horror Molly. Let me know how you fair with them.