Lucius – Use as Master or Henchman

While I’m sitting here waiting for my Lucius box to arrive from The Forge I’ve been sitting here trying to think of ways that I can use him on the table.

Most people are using him as a Master with numerous Guild Guard as well as Austringers to make a nice little force that can activate nearly all at once and get some alpha strikes as well.

Now this does seem like a good idea I don’t know if I’m completely sold on it.

As I have only used Lady J as a master I’ve been thinking of what I can do using him as a Henchman to Lady J. Now I know that means that I’ll be spending 10ss on getting him on the table which in my mind means I’ll be putting him in on a 35ss game or higher.

Now looking at his abilities the one that I keep coming back to that I can use in any game with any unit is his Reinforcements (0) action. Now if you don’t know this ability with it you preform a CC:13 cast to move any unit in your deployment zone within 4″ of this model.

This I think can be exploited a lot. You move Lucius up his 10″ then cast this on someone and put them 4″ in front of him. So who could you do this on… My favourite 2 that have came to mind are Ryle and Lady J Herself.

Let’s see how this works:

Lady Justice and Lucius – You move Lucius up 10″ and cast Reinforcements. Place Lady J  4″ in front of him but behind cover so she can’t be seen. Next activation  Activate Lady Justice and move her 10″. as you so far have moved 24″ from your starting position you should be in range of your 2″ Sword and be able to use your Melee Expert attack.

Even without the charge going off you have and effective 26″ range with Lady J which is massive on a 3′ table.

Ryle and Lucius – this one is a little different but has the same gist as the Lady J version. You move Lucius up 10″ and cast Reinforcements. Place Ryle up to 4″ in front of him but have him closer to Lucius than the enemy. Next activation have Ryle use his (0) Socially Repressed action to push him 4″ away from Lucius (see there was a reason to have him being closer than the enemy) then take your pick at unleashing 3 ranged shots one ranged, walk and attack or walk twice and shoot.

Lastly one thing you can do is add Papa Loco to the mix and then have Lucius pull Papa up to get into Combat earlier so he goes boom in the opponents deployment zone… or to tie up multiple models by being in close combat range of more than one figure say for example the Steampun k Abomination train so you can take out 2-3 when he dies.

Ok that’s it from me for now… I’m hoping I get Lucius here and painted before Sunday so I can field him on the weekend and see what works!

Let me know what you think!

3 Responses to “Lucius – Use as Master or Henchman”

1. Bill@GL says:

   February 10, 2011 at 5:03 am

   The challenge to using this with Ryle is that Ryle is not a friendly model. Due to Ryles Can’t connect ability, he cannot be pulled up using reinforcements.

   As for Lucius in a list as a henchman not master, I have not played it out yet. I expect he will be a bit too expensive for my taste, even in a 35 point game. I figure he needs to take the place of one of the unique models, either a Family, Sam Hopkins, Judge, or Executioner. I am not sure how that will work with the crew, as he is more expensive than all those.

   Then again, maybe building a stripped down special forces crew (guild guards, guard captains, and lucius) and tossing a guild master (J, Perdita, Sonia) on top would be a viable way to play. Its soemthing to try out, which I will be doing in the future. I have seen some good success for the Friekorps led by the Vicki’s, so maybe this works the same way. I imagine the list would be:
   Lady J / Sonia / Perdita
   Lucius (10)
   Austinger (5)
   2x Guild Guards (8)
   Guard Captains (7)
   Drill Seargent (3)
   2 stones plus cache.

   Honestly, I would probably toss Lady J into this, as she brings some melee punch, adds to the crews CB (inspiring swordplay), and brings the SS pool to 6.

2. Lord Shaper says:

   February 10, 2011 at 4:41 pm

   @Bill – I thought I missed something. Thanks for pointing it out about Ryle. Now if there was a way to get rid of that ability we’d be set but even using his brother we can’t do it…

   There has to be something to do that doesn’t there?

   I’m with you thinking that Lucius works best with Lady J and I could see him replacing the Judge or the Executioner as he is no slouch in Close Combat.

   Also the ability he has to reflip for scenario is something that I can see being really useful as well as we want the SS for Lady J.

   The more I think about Ryle I don’t know where he fits in the Guild. I can’t even really see Levi or Ramos use him either. He could add some more shooting to Perdita but for the cost you’d be better off with a Friekorp Trapper.

   I really need to sit down and play with Sonnia as well… I have to figure out how to use her to her potential. I can see the Freikorp Flamer guys working well with her as well hehe.

   This is what I was thinking off for Lady J/Lucius at 35ss

   Lady J
   Governors Proxy (2)
   Lucius (10)
   Guild Guard x2 (8)
   Death Marshal (4)
   Austringer (5)
   Watcher (3)
   And 2ss for Lady J

   I think there has to be at least 1 Death Marshal in every list I do mainly for the reason of Slow to Die has had me kill off to much… I’ve wiped out Levi because of it as I took out the Hollow Waifs.

   And with the official watcher model coming soon it’s going to be something everyone should be using!

   How annoyed with Rasputina players who can’t move the December Acolytes out side of their deployment zones to sit on objectives!

3. Bill@GL says:

   February 11, 2011 at 1:09 am

   Not entirely true in regards to Hoff and Ryle. Ryles ability is tricky on how its worded.

   “Can’t Connect: This model is never considered a friendly model to its Crew for the purpose of selecting a target for Talents or Spells”

   The key there is _for_the_purpose_of selecting_a_target_

   So he is friendly in terms of overall crew use, just not for selecting as a target. As such, Hoff’s ability lets Ryle ignore this.Its only when Ryle needs to be targeted that he becomes unfriendly.

   The overall wording for Lucius’ Reinforcements is tricky, as it does not specifically say “a target friendly model”. By RAW, Ryle can be picked up with this. I do not think that was the intention however.