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Thursday, 30 March 2017

Goblin Cult Crew

The Goblin Cult is the first SMG crew I have finished, and one of only two that were fleshed out at all. In early 2016 Knight Models proclaimed 'coming soon' for SHIELD and HYDRA, however neither materialised. In addition, the Elektra card which materialised had her Affiliated with The Hand (Marvel ninja clan), and gave her Affinity to Kingpin suggesting plans were considered for at least 6 Factions during early development. Which makes the failure to adequately support or promote SMG by Knight all the more disappointing, as I think that could have led to some very cool characters being released.

With that polemic out of the way, on to the Goblin Cult! So what do we have? Well for one I have yet to play SMG, so my thoughts are all theories. SMG is basically an extra 'skin' of rules for BMG, but there are a few noticeable design features.

The first thing that sticks out is that crews are really geared to 400 Rep rather than the tournament standard of 350 for BMG. I say this simply because Goblin Cult can assemble a 340 Rep crew (with or without Venom), but not one at 350. The next thing is that the Spider-types (the two Spider-man options and Venom) have a suite of Traits bundled under a single label (Arachnid), and similarly the Goblin-types (Green Goblin and Goblin Knight) have a Trait bundle (Goblin Serum). The impact of this is that some bonuses are not immediately obvious, and these characters may carry a few more Traits than many of the typical equivalents in BMG. In addition, all of the Goblin Cult (except Venom) have the Fly Trait, making them highly mobile. The array of Traits is likely the driver for the relatively high Rep costs of the SMG characters overall.

The high Rep costs means that an SMG crew looks lighter on numbers than many or most equivalent size BMG crews (at 400 Rep I would expect 6-12 models), making competing for Objectives a trickier proposition, and I guess forcing the Goblin Cult to take a swarm head on since they can be outscored simply by not being able to cover all Objectives.

I hope to answer these questions for myself fairly soon as Brummie and me have a game planned, allowing him to use some high value Free Agent, Sidekick and leader characters.
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19 comments:

  1. Simon Quinton 30 March 2017 at 01:16

    They look cracking together dude. Looking forward to the game dude. I think the Hand could of been a cool faction.

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    1. pulpcitizen30 March 2017 at 13:04

      Cheers mate. We need to book a date for the heavyweight characters throwdown. :)

      Delete
  2. JamieM30 March 2017 at 01:45

    They do look good all together - and who doesn't love Green Goblin on his flying skateboard ;)

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    1. pulpcitizen30 March 2017 at 13:06

      Cheers JamieM. :)

      I do love his Goblin Glider and have always thought it was something cool. :)

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  3. Michal DwarfCrypt30 March 2017 at 01:52

    What a great goblins band! Painting is really awesome!

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  4. Michael Awdry30 March 2017 at 04:45

    What a fabulous group, I bet they are fun to play with too.

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    1. pulpcitizen30 March 2017 at 13:08

      Thanks Michael. :)

      I am hoping they will prove an entertaining bunch on the table. :)

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  5. Kieron30 March 2017 at 10:02

    They look great. I think it could be fun to take them to a less serious (po faced) tournament to see how they match up. The flight could seriously offset the numbers issue.

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    1. pulpcitizen30 March 2017 at 13:11

      Thanks Kieron. :)

      I'd love to take them, but the only TO I asked about it refused.... :(

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    2. Kieron30 March 2017 at 14:41

      Was that an arbitrary "they aren't balanced because I say they aren't ruling"?

      Because the rest of the game is so finely tuned...

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    3. pulpcitizen30 March 2017 at 23:25

      Pretty well summed up there Kieron...both on rationale and contrary view! :)

      I'd argue against that TO's view that at 350 Rep SMG crews would be disadvantaged in the numbers game which is one of the strongest pivots in the scoring/winning, limited selections to create utility, and relative strengths being vulnerable to the usual firearms etc.

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  6. Blaxkleric30 March 2017 at 10:03

    Terrific group shot. If they play half as well as you've painted them then they should be a real force on the tabletop :-)

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    1. pulpcitizen30 March 2017 at 13:13

      Thanks a lot mate. :)

      As for a real force, I am on a bit of a losing streak against Simon Q..... :)

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  7. Wouter30 March 2017 at 12:09

    What a wonderful looking group.
    You did an ace job on these.

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    1. pulpcitizen30 March 2017 at 13:14

      Thanks very much Wouter. Overall I am pretty happy with how they turned out. :)

      Delete
  8. FourEyedMonster9 April 2017 at 05:48

    A great group shot. That the Green Goblin is at the highest point is also very fitting.

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  9. Hiền Trang26 October 2021 at 21:37

    They look great Bồn nước Đại Thành

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