Press Gangers

Press Gangers are recruited to replace lost deck hands - and these hardened sea dogs have spent their life upon the waves - travelling from port to port. They frequent the local bars in rowdy gangs - subjecting the locals to beatings, often resulting in the forcible recruitment of new members...

Basic Info

Mercenary - This unit will work for Template:Crucible Guard mercenary, Template:Cryx Mercenary, Template:Cygnar Mercenary, Template:Khador Mercenary, or Template:Menoth Mercenary.

Abilities

• Entire Unit
  • Template:Ambush2
  • Template:Advance Deployment
  • Template:Tough
  • Template:Gang
  • Template:Shanghai

• Lass
  • She has +1 CMD.
  • Template:Officer
  • Template:Seduction

Weapons

Hand Weapon - 0.5" reach, POW 3, P+S 9 melee weapon.

Theme Forces

• Mercenaries
  • Template:Operating Theatre Only if a Cephalyx Dominator is attached
  • Template:The Talion Charter

• Other Factions
  • Infernal players can use this unit in the Template:Hearts of Darkness theme, but only if Crosse2 is leading the army.
  • Furthermore, Mercenaries can be hired by other Factions. Normally those Factions' themes will have a limit on how many models they can hire. Refer to #Other Theme Forces, below.

Thoughts on Press Gangers

Press Gangers in a nutshell

Press Gangers punish your opponent for bringing living infantry. They die fast but come back almost as quickly. If your opponent brought warrior models, that is. If not, Press Gangers are weak against high ARM jacks and beasts. Assuming your opponent does not quickly deal with them, the unit can become quite large. They're either the first wave chaff with a tiny bit of jamming ability to deliver your real force or they're ambushing. But at 7 points for a minimum unit of advance deploying or ambushing tough models what do you expect? You get what you pay for, and for their cost Press Gangers aren't bad.

Combos & Synergies

Press Gangers are part of the normal Pirate boat and synergies with other Sea Dogs (by giving them more members) as well as Captain Phinneus Shae

• First Mate Hawk more hitting power against warrior models.
• Bosun Grogspar because he prevents them getting knocked down
• Doc Killingsworth 4+ Tough
• Lord Rockbottom - his coins normally go on better models
• Bloody Bradigan gets enabled to beat things up.
• Fiona the Black likes either ambushing or advance deploying models to channel through.

Drawbacks & Downsides

• Downright awful stats.
• Gang is the only way they hit most targets - so they need to double team and bunch up.
• Vulnerable to blast damage.
• The Lass is an Officer model, not a Leader model, so you can't Field Promote a Grunt to replace her. When she dies, you lose Seduction entirely.

Tricks & Tips

• Press Gangers can add grunts to their own unit. So, split your unit up to "Daisy Chain" more Press Gangers. For instance:
  • Send 6 Gangers into 3 enemy models, and 4 Gangers into 4 different enemies.
  • When one of the first 6 trigger Shangai, place the new Press Ganger next to one of the other 4 so that he can (potentially) trigger Shangai too.

Other

Trivia

• Sculptor: Todd Harris
• Originally the guy with the lantern was the officer and the Lass was a grunt with special rules.
• Some players like buying models from other factions and converting them with pirate hats to represent people shanghai'd. This is why you occasionally see a Gallows Grove with a pirate hat (or other ridiculous model) as a member of the Sea Dog Boarding Crew.
• Originally released in Pirates of the Broken Coast (2007)