Cults are loyal followers who commit horrific criminal acts to take over Gotham City. Dozens of believers come together to carry out these dangerous acts, making the cults very difficult to capture and eliminate.
The different Cults of Gotham have representation in Batman Miniature Game. They are organizations based on the offering and worship of a person/deity and are ruthless in their practices.
Cults are special in several ways, as they have unique rules (even in the formation of the crew itself). You can take as many models with the Rank: Sidekick and Free Agent (who have the affiliation of the crew) as you wish, and additionally 1 Free Agent who does not share the affiliation.
When you choose the Boss that will lead your crew, it will always have a trait that will refer to its particular Cult, and you will not be able to include any model that has a trait from a different Cult. Also, instead of using the Resource value to play your cards, they use their own called Faith, which they will have to generate in different ways during the game.
This trait will give you powerful skills to use in the game. For example, you can always redirect the damage inflicted on your Boss to another of your models (although keep in mind that the rest of the damage will return to the Boss), normally keeping it safe (it costs 1 Faith Point). It is also used to enhance the effect of "Resources" by spending an additional cost. Any Faith you haven't spent during the round will be returned to the Boss as Stun Damage, so don't be afraid to spend it, otherwise it can be dangerous.
As we can see, they are crews with medium flexibility, since they depend only on their own cultists, but with their powers of Faith they will have a lot of tricks up their sleeves. As the different Cults have specific cards for each one, in this article we are going to focus on Kobra Cult, the first cult that has been released.
The (X) Cultist trait, which all Cult crews have, will usually tell you how you gain Faith during the game. Kobra cultist (which every crew member in this article will have) for example, tells you that every time you make an attack that gets at least 1 success on an opponent, you'll get 1 Faith Point.
“My present reality is not a pretty sight. It is a thing of agony and delirium” Batman
The Deck
As an example of the duality of this objective deck, we have Awakening and Sabotage. Awakening is a card that is scored by removing an enemy model as a casualty, close to a friendly model, while this enemy was suffering from the Poison effect (an effect easily caused by the Kobra Cult). It is an objective based on aggression, although it also has a very specific precondition. To score it, it is best to have another card like it, since the resource will add the Poison effect to your attack, and if you improve its effect, you will force the affected model to immediately perform a Poison test, which could be definitive if you have not finished with him.
Sabotage, on the other hand, is based on Revealing enemy Suspects, and also you don’t leave any Suspect near the edges of the board. To do this, always try to have models on the sides, to be able to remove these Suspects, and also flank your rival.
Its resource allows you to play with the Poison effect that you have previously inflicted, to strengthen yourself in attack or defense, and, if you improve its effect, it can be used so that, instead of performing the previous effect, you can pass this effect to another enemy model.
“Let the glory be revealed to you!” The Cult
The Great Plan is the other card dedicated to the Kobra Cult. It is also different. If you were previously rewarded for doing casualties and revealing Suspects, now you will have to place them.
It is a card that is played in Rise the Plan, so the rival will try to place some Suspect on your corners of the board, because the rival will not be able to place them on his own. Use this to activate a trap at the right time. Its resource allows you to place the Cobra Swarm model in contact with an enemy model that is close to a friendly model with the Void Priest trait. You can even inflict Poison on him if he fails an Endurance test, if you improve the effect, you can immediately attack him with your cobras, eventually increasing the Poison effect.
Ritual is one of the cards available to all cults (not exclusive to the Kobra Cult). It's a card that may seem terribly difficult to score, but it really isn't. Since the opponent will know that you want to score this card, he will try to place the Suspects again in a position where it suits you to direct the fight. Measure the distances a bit before placing the Suspect that is going to serve as your “central”, then you won't find that any of the other Suspects are obstructed by a distant friendly Suspect.
Its resource is a very good option to score this card, since it allows you to place two Suspects instead of one, and, in addition, at a certain distance from the one who places them. If you also pay its upgrade cost, you can place them wherever you want. This action is also useful for scoring Can Be Anyone.
Can Be Anyone is a card that you will score immediately, if when placing a Suspect within 6” of an enemy model. No model can see the one who is placing it. If you cannot use the previous resource, try to always leave a model out of sight of enemies, to be able to perform this action without being seen.
The resource will give you the always interesting trait Sneak Attack, with which you can defeat models with a single attack knowing that they will not be able to Effort. By upgrading the effect, you would also be able to roll an additional attack die.
These cards are the last ones we are going to talk about. They are available to all cults, and reflect the aggressive tone of this crew.
Sacrifice will be scored after inflicting Injury damage to an enemy that is within 4" of a friendly Suspect (an inspired Henchman would be the ideal candidate) and New Followers will score it by producing a KO on an enemy model that is within 4" of a friendly Suspect, so the strategy when scoring them should be similar, although the last one asks you to use the models to inflict Stun damage (to produce KO).
Sacrifice's resource allows you to nullify annoying Reveal actions from opponents in exchange for damage on one of our nearby models (this is quite manageable if it's on a Cobra Swarm), and if you improve its effect you won't even take the damage.
The New Followers Resource gives you the Arrest trait, which if you don't want to lose attack actions on KO models, is a good option, but the best thing is its improved effect, as it will move you to the active model 4”. Mobility in this crew is always remarkable.
The Models
Right now, the best option to lead a cult crew is Kobra. If you have him in play you will get the Deadliest Man on Earth, which makes him a quite adaptable leader, being able to obtain Scheming 3 to score better Ritual, for example, or Sabotage and The Great Plan, with Street Fighter he will become a fearsome fighter and with Exhaustive Planner will have a way to stop, once per game, a crucial resource of the rival. He has amazing base stats, which coupled with his damaging Sword and his Martial Artist and Master Fighter traits, will allow you to get him into every fight, and score all your aggression cards.
A good option is to use his Order trait to place a Suspect with a nearby friendly model, and be able to score those cards that ask you to be close to the model you are going to remove as a casualty (or leave KO, since it also has Reinforced Gloves). Obviously, he's a Void Priest so once per turn, you can give the trait to inflict Poison on an attack (costs 2 Faith Points), so you can easily score Awakening.
Lady Eve is also a good choice. She has a very powerful weapon (her Kobra Sword) and another one with a high efficacy (Kobra Gas). Also, she has above average stats.
She'll give us 1 Faith Point at the start of each round for her Fervent Follower, and she's another Void Priest so she inflicts more poison. She has the Kobra Armor, which is shared by almost all members of the crew, and her Weapon Master for better impact, so she is more than ready to put her in the thick of battle, and score Awakening and Sacrifice.
“If you seek to lure us into another trap… !” Lady Eve
One of the best characters we could include to score the objectives of placing and revealing Suspects would be The Nagas. He has a deployment advantage for the Hidden trait, and a good Range to always be Inspired. He is the best candidate to quickly score Can be Anyone or Sabotage, for example. It is important to remember that he is very good in melee combat and that he is well-armed.
As a ranged support the best is Naga Hazard Trooper 1. He has a couple of very effective weapons at medium distance, and also has a support trait in Follow Me! which will serve to better move your troops.
The biggest disadvantage he has is that he is quite slow, but he makes up for this by having quite a high endurance thanks to his armor and his high Endurance of 7.
Another option as a ranged support is Lancehead Captain, although his weapon is not as precise as the previous one, he has the Take Cover! trait that protects our other henchmen by giving them more defense markers. In order to spread Poison further, Kobra Bestowed is the last Void Priest we'll add, as well as being used to set up Suspects to complete the Ritual.
We will finally add Lancehead 1 to have an expendable henchman to place some of the riskiest Suspects or die for the leader as a good cultist.
That’s all. In future articles we will show other Cults crew options and how to play them.
Now is your turn! Choose the cult that you like the most and try the advantages of this incredible crew!
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