Of Gilded Pork ~ Thoughts on Midas

Starting to get more games in again... and managing to stick with minions for a bit in spite of my faction ADD. Thought I would put down some of my initial thoughts on Midas.

First thought: OMG his tier is AMAZING for who he is and what he wants to do. I love having bonegrinders hand out free charges from the get go every game (sprint could be awesome as well, but seems to defeat some of my further thoughts on how he works, more on this later). You lose some AD and access to pathfinder, but Roadhogs have pathfinder built in and his tier grants advanced move to his beasts. All and all a wash.

Onto the meat and potatoes of Midas. As far as I can tell, he is meant to be played in waves. Start by sending in your beasts to die, take their bodies to fuel the spells that make your infantry better, when the infantry start running out, feat and bring back the beasts again. Target things that want to drop heavies and problem characters, and try to ride out the storm a second time.

I think that getting the most out of him will involve mastering the timing of these waves and in the knowledge of getting the most out of each group. In general I am coming round to min units of bonegrinders (more magical zots, more advanced move; drawback being if they are benefiting from Battle Lust, you get slightly less out of the spell). I don't think I would ever take brigands with him either, as they don't do all that much for him. End of day, a couple of units of Slaughterhousers and a million bonegrinders should probably meet all your infantry needs with him.

Beasts I have been running something along the line of 4 razor boars, 2 road hogs, and 2 warhogs (one living, one dead in theme force). This seems to give me a pretty good mix of things, although I may try to work in a gun boar at some point just to see what is up.

Perfect game with him I see trading razor boars for position and any solo they can get their tusks on, Roadhogs try to hit infantry as hard as they can with flaming sprays. In general, you want things to die so you can fuel your later turns. I also tend to not respect fury at all in the early stages. I run everything really hot and let things frenzy or die... is a weird place to be in for me as I am used to trying to preserve at all costs.

If the 2 games I have played so far with him are anything to judge by, I need to work on getting the most out of my slaughterhousers... I am just not there yet in the rhythm of the game yet. Also the fact that bonegrinders have the potential to be late game melee beaters is pretty hot (given they cost the same as McThralls and have an accurate ranged attack).

I will also say that by default his feat seems to feel defensive to me... at least on the turn you use it, but putting a bunch of beasts back down on the table feels really powerful. Don't know if it is true or not, but seems like a good attrition thing.

Is This Your Card?

Or the fine art of the force.

I was watching one of the more competitive players at my LGS play a Mordikar Skorne list and was mildly enlightened by him talking through his thought process while playing. He totally possessed a tool I was missing. In the same way a magician can force you to pick the card he knows, the Skorne player called his turn...

You will kill 5-6 swordsmen, 2-3 Accurii, and hurt (but not kill) the Rhinodon. He even called it out and watched as it all went according to plan. I came to realize I was missing a tool, the ability to "force".

Knowing pretty much at all times what your opponent can kill and knowing how to maximize on those losses (which for some casters is easier than others), was a new way of thinking about the game that I hadn't actively thought about yet. I am used to doing all the calculations separately (threat range is X, damage output is Y, etc.), but watching him basically dictate his opponents turn was a bit disconcerting.

All and all I know he is a bit out of my league (he has placed highly in several major events), but the glimpse into his mindset for a moment showed me the next level of the game that I was only vaguely aware of previously.