Malifaux Musings - What The Rat Doin’?
Written By: Jay Edwards
With the recent official full release of M4E, I figured I would take the opportunity to discuss my feelings on the beta overall and where I feel the game has ended up after the dust has settled. I also want to look at the Malifaux Rat, a contentious model throughout this period, as kind of a lens on how the game has grown these last few months.
Overall, I really like where Malifaux has ended up at the end of all this. The game overall flows better and just feels more like a true tactical game instead of just an average skirmish game. Keywords, at least the half dozen or so that I’ve played, have flexibility to counter their bad matchups without there being a crew or combination that distinctly “the best”. Models feel like they have a specific role rather than the problem with the newer ones in the last edition that felt like they had no idea what they really wanted to do. I’ve also noticed that a lot of models have slid further into their specific role and lost some of their pointless flexibility that they really didn’t need. The Malifaux Rat, for example, has lost all of its ability to attack but it is now more focused in what it does: give Blight and make Rat Kings. With an attack action, there was always the temptation to stick in combat or charge for attacking but it rarely did anything. Now it feels like a 2SS peon model that’s meant to walk up and give Blight.
The increase in terrain is interesting and adds some unique dimension to Malifaux that makes players think in 3 dimensions. It also allows for some models to be even more specialized by being able to ignore vertical height with Expert Climber. Something that players will have to watch out for though is the size of each piece. For a table that I’m planning, I was going to try and make things simple for myself by making a few huge pieces that could represent a decent chunk of the terrain (think like a brick of a couple different buildings). The problem that this presents is that it could be argued that it’s one contiguous piece, meaning that certain abilities that target terrain could target the entire piece (Frozen Ruins from Savage being an example). It also would cut down the number of available pieces for Scout the Rooftops or Search the Area. I would recommend that more smaller pieces over fewer bigger pieces. I would caution against anything larger than 5”x5” or 6”x6” so that you have several pieces of terrain available.
Something that I’m really happy about with the beta was the willingness of the Wyrd team to make huge shifts every week in order to find where things belonged. Plague underwent multiple revisions because it was quite difficult to find what niche it fit as did a bunch of other keywords and I see that as a good thing. The huge changes during the beta mean that once the game is released everything will feel unique and complete. The humble Malifaux rat went from an ankle-biter to a weird plague bomb to now having a purpose of running up and giving out Blight very consistently. It also now feels more like an actual rat - in the grand scheme of what damage is in the game, a rat biting you isn’t going to deal any damage but it can get you sick and the rat itself only becomes dangerous when there’s multiple nearby. These aren’t Elden Ring rats; they are just normal adorable little squeakers.
That said, the biggest problem with the beta has been what I just praised it for. Multiple times, I have read complaint posts and have experienced the frustration of a crew changing how it feels from the week before. I can completely understand that feeling and it’s reasonable that it could have turned some players sour on the game but I really hope those people take a little break and come back once the game is released. Now that all the seismic shifts are done and the ground has settled, Malifaux is in a really solid spot.
All in all, the future of Malifaux looks incredibly bright! Our local group has a fall league planned and we’re all excited to get some more M4E games in!
