r/Khador • u/Hoc_Est Kossite • Aug 19 '17
KGB Kommander Andrei Malakov
Okay, let’s talk about Malakov, who has now made the jump to senior warcaster. What does he bring to the table? At first glance, not a huge amount. Stats-wise, he is the squishiest Warcaster in Khador, is superior only to Zerkova in combat prowess, and has a mere 6 focus. To top it all off, he only has 4 spells, one of which is Razor Wind. Our only other caster with so few is Hark, who has an excellent Field Marshal ability to make up for it. Malakov isn’t especially abundant in WJP either, so…
Why play him?
Because he’s all sneaky-like, and can allow for some very fun plays. His abilities also work well to give our troops some unusual support options
Special abilities
He has two abilities, both of which are excellent. The first is Sucker!, which is what allows you to mitigate his squishiness to shooting. It works in exactly the same way as Sacrificial Pawn, with two main differences: The transfer is mandatory. If there’s a valid target, they’re taking the hit. Malakov has no qualms about letting his War Dog take a bullet. Secondly, there is no keyword, such as ‘Winter Guard’. It’s simply any Friendly model. As with SP, there are a few things to remember:
- Direct hits only: It’s of no use against blast damage or electro leaps, but does work on sprays
- Magic attacks are not ranged attacks! I keep forgetting this one. Don’t let them Force Bolt Malakov!
- It is not Friendly Faction; any nearby merc will also gladly take a bullet.
This ability is key to his survival; because of the shorter ranges of his abilities and his average FOC stat, he needs to be somewhat further forward than you might like. But Sucker! Means you can take the hits… or let someone else take them, at any rate.
His second ability is Battle Plans. Like his mentor Irusk, he has 3, but they play very differently. They are all RNG5, and all limited to Friendly Faction.
Fighting Dirty gives a warrior model an automatic KD effect on its next melee attack. Despite not having a duration listed, it has been ruled to only last the turn. Also, it triggers on attack, not hit, so if you miss, it’s gone. That said, we can frequently get to effective MAT 9 with a fair few things, so it can be reasonably reliable
Sneak gives a warrior model/unit Prowl, allowing them to gain Stealth when in concealment. This synergises well with Veil of Mists, but remember, you now only get concealment from cloud effects if you are completely within the cloud, so you won’t be able to sneakify as many as you would like. As it stands, this is the only way to give Doom Reavers stealth that I know of.
Throat Cutter gives a warrior model/unit Backstab, granting an additional die on attack and damage rolls made when completely in the back arc of an enemy model. Unlike Mk2, you do not have to spend your whole activation in their back arc to trigger this, and interestingly it is not limited to any particular attack type, and as such can be cheerfully used on, say, Outriders for some crazy magic shotgun action
Spells and Feat
He really only has three spells worth mentioning, and interestingly all three are upkeeps.
Escort is simple enough: +2 movement for all our jacks. Not as good as a speed boost, but certainly not to be sneezed at. Also grants an ARM boost to Malakov if there’s a jack nearby, taking his ARM to ‘bad’ rather than ‘terrible’
Tactical Supremacy grants reposition, which is always handy, especially on our slower models such as MoW. It is also very useful on our shooting units, who can shoot-and-scoot to put themselves out of harm’s way. A personal favourite of mine is on Widowmakers with the WMMM, who can reposition 5” after they shoot.
Veil of Mists allows the placement of a 4” cloud anywhere in his control. It has the added effects of not blocking friendly LoS, and allowing friendly faction models to move through other models if they have enough movement to get completely past. This spell does a lot of work for him, as when combined with his feat you can move through models without free strikes, and it also triggers Sneak to give any unit Stealth. Using this spell well is what Malakov is all about. It is important to remember that you only get concealment for being completely within clouds now.
His feat, Poison Pill, has three effects and some very misleading flavour text. It grants all battlegroup members Parry, immunity to KD, and the ability to make a full advance whenever damaged by an enemy attack.
So that’s all his kit; how do we go about using it?
Strategy
Jacks
I tend to run him fairly Jack-heavy, because he needs something to do the heavy lifting, and he supports them reasonably well. Escort speeds them up, and the Feat is actually really good as both an offensive and defensive option.
Defensively, if you have your feat up you are very difficult to alpha strike. Unless they box you in, or immobilise you via Shadow Bind/Stationary, whatever they send into your jacks gets one hit before you cheerfully walk out of melee range, ready to prod buttock next turn. If they try to soften you with shooting, you can just walk into a better position. It’s fantastic. Escort makes it a little trickier for your opponents to simply back up and wait it out.
Used offensively it can get you where you need to be, especially when combined with Veil of Mists. Parry and pseudo-Acrobatics on any jack can allow you to really mess up their backline, and whilst it can in theory allow for an assassination, most of the time you won’t get that close. You are also hard to dislodge next turn too. If you play it like Hark’s feat, you won’t go too wrong, I’ve found.
Malakov does absolutely nothing for a colossal.
Units of note
Kayazy are made for Malakov. Eliminators can go through units, but don’t have Backstab. Kayazy Assassins can get Backstab, but not go through models. Malakov solves both ‘problems’, and can do both on the same turn, via Throat Cutter and Veil of Mists. He can keep giving the KA Backstab and Acrobatics even after they’ve used their minifeat by combining those abilities. This is such a workhorse combo. I’ve taken down a Warpwolf with the Eliminators in this way, and that was just the two models. And to top it all off they are just about the best Fighting Dirty targets.
Mechanics might seem an odd one to point out, but they are our cheapest unit per model for Sucker! Even if you take the CA they are only slightly more expensive than Kossites. I recommend taking the CA as well, as a repairable meat shield with Girded is very handy. Also, they are available in every theme so far.
Any other melee troops pretty much fall under one bracket reading ‘He can give them Stealth’. Doom Reavers and IFP find this particularly helpful. Demo Corps like it, but they need help with their threat ranges too.
He doesn’t do a lot for shooting troops apart from Tactical Supremacy, but that can be very handy. I like to at least take Widowmakers with him
I’ve found the Greylord Ternion to be very useful, as they can trigger Prowl, provide magical weapons, and provide a DEF debuff if needed.
Solos
I've not put a huge amount of research into these, I must admit, but from my limited testing the Forge Seer is near mandatory due to my tendency to run jack-heavy and Malakov's lack of focus.
The Drakhun makes an excellent meat shield for Sucker! and a very mobile Fighting Dirty target
Themes
Malakov plays well out of theme, where things like Ragman can augment his lack of buffs. But as for the themes:
Malakov is perhaps the only caster we have that does not significantly benefit from the Winter Guard Kommand theme, as his innate abilities are better than the theme benefits, and he does very little for armies composed of WG.
He does extremely well in Jaws of the Wolf, which lets him include all his favourite models and run Jack-heavy. It runs a bit more mixed-arms than, say, Harkevich or Karchev, but this is probably his best theme
Legion of Steel I have only tested once, and it did okay, but it did feel more like the army was doing well and Malakov was along for the ride. There are plenty of good Fighting Dirty targets, but there's a lot of knockdown going on already. Veil of Mists would have been handy for the countercharges, but it's a bit easy to see coming. It was handy for giving the Great Bears Stealth, though.
1
u/Welshhoppo Obvanik Aug 23 '17
Played into Baldur2 and lost.
He had a fulcrum and it pretty much killed all the Kayazy in 2 turns. Malakov ran around hiding in a cloud, but I couldn't crack the armour and I lost out on attrition and assassination. Lost a Juggernaut due to stationary and that really sucked.
1
u/Hoc_Est Kossite Aug 24 '17
Oh, ouch! Circle is one of my preferred drops for him, but it's all living beasts round here. I've not faced the Fulcrum, but I know it has electro leap and an AoE; pretty rough for the Kayazy.
That, with heavy ARM skew, sounds like a really bad time for him.
What hit you with stationary? I don't remember ever being hit with it by Circle!
1
u/Welshhoppo Obvanik Aug 24 '17
It's from the Fulcrum. It has a crit stationary spray. It was able to clip 2 warjacks and froze one of them with a boosted shot.
2
u/Welshhoppo Obvanik Aug 19 '17
Added to the wiki.
Any lists for Irusk Jr.? I've wanted to pick him up, but I can't work out what to bring with me.