Mighty Minion - Gaki

Mighty Minion - GakiIt's been a while since I've posted one of these and I really want to rant about the merits of the Gaki, or as I think of them, the piranhas of the spirit world.

Strengths

• Walk of 5 and charge of 7 is pretty fast for a Resser
• Nice cheap minion at 3ss
• Insatiable hunger gives them a free walk in the end closing phase against living crews
• slow to die gives you the opportunity to lash out or snack on a corpse when killed, its one of their most powerful benefits
• +1 dg when inflicting damage within 6 of Kirai
• Devour Anything spell allows you to sacrifice height 1 models, which together with unstoppable eaters ability, and two other Gaki, means you can target height two models. The target is sacrificed if it fails the duel, regardless of remaining wounds
• The Absorb spell is a great finisher, cast this on a defender with 3 wounds or less, sacrifice them and gain fast. Do it a second time and gain reactivate.
• 0 action Eat Your Fill allows all wounds to healed
• 1 action Snack allows a healing flip and is best used as a slow to die action.
• Balanced damage output at 2/2/4.

Weaknesses

• Low Willpower of 3
• Low Cast of 3
• Never run alone unless you really have to, their melee trigger becomes useless
• Avoid putting them up against a magical blast crew, they'll simply evaporate
• Don't let them get to far ahead otherwise they'll be out of Kirai's Seishin range and her damage buff
• Slow to die action is useless if they are outside melee without a corpse counter to chug on, or something to attack
• They are entirely selfish, one corpse equals one happy Gaki.

Play Style
Gaki are fast and best run in packs. They are voracious in combat but have no range combat abilities.
They can unlimited trigger off each other in combat until enough damage is done to kill, devour or absorb their prey. They can then stop and snack or pickup any corpse counters and keep going.
A Gaki with a corpse counter can cheat death itself by saving that snack for when it most needs it. When killed it simply pulls out the victims corpse, has a snack (using its slow to die action) and makes a healing flip. It's the ultimate energy bar for these little guys.
With their spirit ability they can simply pass through intervening terrain and their insatiable hunger ability means that a living crew is going to to find they move on them very quickly.
Synergies
The most obvious synergy is more Gaki. The bigger the pack, the more voracious they become in combat, particularly when up against 40 and 50mm based models where their 1 inch melee range and defender melee range trigger Feeding Frenzy.




They also synergise well with Datsu Ba who can buff their healing or movement, can summon more of them, and can leverage them to get into combat.
They also act as a meat shield and glue for the higher priced minions like Dead Rider, Shikome and Ikiryo. Simply run the Gaki on front, get stuck into combat and then send in the Dead Rider as a closer. Alternatively, run it the other way round, pounce your prey with the rider and then charge the Gaki in to mop up or take care of any unwanted attention. Should the dead rider die, you'll be generating two corpse counters for the pack to pick up and feed on.




An Onryo can give them immediate revenge and they can cover the Gaki assault with their ranged spell malevolence.

I also like the Ikiro's 0 action Call Spirits as another way to enhance their movement.
All up I'm a big fan of these guys, but they'll only work for you if you can get them through the field of fire and up close and personal.




Gaki get my Zombie kill of the week award for putting Teddy in his place in two separate games recently. In game one I simply cheated in the red joker on damage and the another severe for the eight wounds required to finish him off.

In the second game his hard to wound was saving him so with one action left I tried an absorb, now I missed out by 1 on the duel total but it would have been so powerful if I had managed it. My opponent promptly swapped Kade and Teddy around, with Teddy taking no further part in the game and Kade getting picked to pieces in the next turn.
It almost makes up for Mr Fantasy then going on to trounce me in the thunderstruck achievement tournament (see previous article)
I should also give them the Unlucky Monkey award for the game in which I launched three of the at Sonia Creed only to have them burnt to a crisp outside of Kirai's range to ressurect.
I should maybe take some of my own advice.....