Pale+Rider


 * Pale Rider, Guild Minion**

//"And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth." - Revelations 6:8 (KJV) // toc

=__Overview__= The Guild's own Rider, the Pale Rider is a fast-moving ranged combatant, with some clever ways to get increased offensive ability, resilience, and mobility. Depending on when you activate the Rider, the Pale Rider can be a hard-hitting ranged attacker or a fairly resilient and fast (if expensive) objective-grabber.

Like the other Riders, the Pale Rider is fairly fragile for its cost, and likely to be destroyed quickly if directly targeted. However, the Rider is full of tricks and options to keep that from happening. Also like all the Riders, the Pale Rider has a complex adjustable Ability that you can use to give the Pale Rider different abilities depending on your need.

=__Mobility__= Like the other Riders, the Pale Rider is quite mobile, with a **Wk/Cg** of **6/10** and the M**ounted Fusillade Actio**n which allows him to Push up to 10" and take a shot at any point along the way. The Pale Rider can move faster if at least 3 models (or at least 1 with a spell) have been killed or sacrificed during the turn. In this circumstance, he gains **Fast**, which can help tremendously if you're planning to use him for grabbing objectives.

=__Offense__= The Pale Rider has a very notable attack: **Final Moments**, which is apparently the name for the big rifle the model carries. **Final Moments** has a good range of 12" and a very good **Cb 6 + rams**. The Pale Rider also has **Gunfighter** with his Ranged Weapon, so it won't get caught up if attacked at close range. The damage spread is mediocre for such an expensive model at **2/3/4**, but the Pale Rider has a lot of options that can improve that.

First, if the Pale Rider is activated early in the turn (before any models are killed), the Pale Rider gets the **Critical Strike** trigger and a positive twist on the Damage Flip. This can really help with damage, since it can raise damage by 1 or 2 points, and more importantly, lets you Cheat your Damage Flip more often. You can do up to 5 or 6 damage with a shot this way, or more if you flip or Cheat a Joker on the Damage Flip. This won't drop a big or armored enemy model instantly, but it will help.

You can also get **Rapid Shot** or **Fast** if you activate the Pale Rider after other models have died. This means you can do more damage by firing more shots, but each shot will do less damage since you don't have Critical Strike or the positive twist to damage, and you can't really do the kind of hit-and-run **Mounted Fusillade** tactics that make Pale Rider so dangerous.

The Pale Rider has another trigger that can be quite handy, **Ricochet**. This inflicts a simple **1/2/4** damage flip on another model within 3" of the target, and requires an extra Masks suit. This probably won't be enough to kill an enemy model straight up, but it will soften up an enemy model, and can be very valuable against a model that's hard to attack directly, like Perdita or Pandora.

Note also that the Pale Rider gets a benefit from getting the last blow in: every time he killed a target with **Final Moments**, he heals **2 Wd**. If you have multiple attackers, it may help to have the Pale Rider attack second or third if he's wounded, so he can get in the killing blows.

=__Resilience__= The Pale Rider can be very durable or very fragile depending on how you play him. In a straight-up open fight, the Pale Rider has a **Df 5** and a **Wd 9**, plus sometimes a bit of Armor or Hard to Wound. That's decent, but it's not enough to survive under sustained fire, and if caught out in the open, the Pale Rider will die quickly, and you'll be out 9 Soulstones.

However, the Pale Rider has a lot of tricks that will help survival.

Probably the most useful is **Mounted Fusillade**: The Pale Rider can push out from behind cover, shoot, and then duck back into a safe spot again. This means that you can attack with the Pale Rider from a position of relative safety. The Pale Rider operates best when you use this ability to keep it from being caught in the open. Note also that **Mounted Fusillade** is a Push, so it doesn't draw any Disengaging Strikes.

The Pale Rider also heals **2 Wd** every time it kills a model with Final Moments. This can help restore minor damage (or larger damage over time), but isn't as reliable as staying in hiding.

The Pale Rider is also **Bulletproof 1**, which helps against other ranged attacks. Depending on his Stage, he can also gain either **Armor +1** or **Hard to Wound 2**, both of which will help with resilience.

The Pale Rider is also **Immune to Influence**, nonliving, and has **Wp 6**, so many spells and other effects will completely fail against the Pale Rider.

=__Tips and Tricks__= As with other Riders, it's important to be aware of the Pale Rider's **Chasing Death** ability and its three stages. You need to keep track of how many models (friendly or enemy) have been killed or sacrificed in a turn:
 * If no models have been killed or sacrificed, the Pale Rider is in Stage One, and gets Critical Strike and a bonus twist on damage.
 * If one or two models have been killed or sacrificed, the Pale Rider is in Stage Two, and gets Rapid Strike and Armor +1.
 * If three or more models have been killed or sacrificed, the Pale Rider is in Stage Three, and gets Fast and Hard to Wound 2.

You can move up or down one stage as a (0) spell that requires 4 of any suit, and the Pale Rider doesn't have any competing (0) actions, so you can generally assume that you can adjust by one.
 * Use Stage One if you're planning to do hit-and-run attacks with Mounted Fusillade, since it increases your damage.
 * Use Stage Three if you're planning to move around grabbing objectives, or if you want to make multiple strikes.
 * Generally, Stage Two isn't worth it -- Rapid Fire is strictly inferior to Fast for both combat and mobility, and Armor +1 gives fairly similar results to Hard to Wound 2. If you activate when in Stage Two, however, you can use your (0) spell to move to Stage One or Stage Three, so it's a more flexible option.

In general, this means that you should activate the Pale Rider early in the turn if you want to launch attacks, or later in the turn if you want to move around.

=__Master-Specific Tips__= The Pale Rider is a Guild model and offers a lot of mobility to the usually-slow Guild, but it also has significant synergy with Leveticus. You're most likely to see the Pale Rider with either C. Hoffman or Leveticus.

C. Hoffman can benefit from the Pale Rider's fast movement with his Drawn to Metal ability, and can boost the Pale Rider with healing, Reactivations, or just using its attacks with Machine Puppet. The Pale Rider is one of the three most likely models for carrying Hoffman around (alongside the Peacemaker and the Mechanical Rider.)

Leveticus doesn't have a lot of synergy with the Pale Rider as a Master, but the Pale Rider usually operates solo anyway, and Avatar Leveticus gets significant benefit from having the Pale Rider in play. Avatar Leveticus can also summon the Pale Rider after Manifesting.

Other Guild Masters may benefit from the Pale Rider's speed, since many Guild models are quite slow.

=__Minion-Specific Tips__= Generally, the Pale Rider operates separately from the rest of your Crew, moving around, guarding flanks, grabbing objectives, or defending key areas with guerilla-like ambush attacks to dart in and out of danger.

One special minion interaction is notable. The Outcast model Lazarus works very well in an Avatar Leveticus Crew, since Lazarus can copy the powerful special abilities of most of the Riders. However, Lazarus can't be hired in a Crew that contains Guild models. There's a way around this, though: hire Lazarus alongside the other non-Guild Riders at the start of the game, then have Avatar Leveticus summon the Pale Rider after he Manifests. Thematically, Lazarus might not like it, but in play, it means that Lazarus can then copy the Pale Rider's powerful abilities.

=__Playing Against Pale Rider__= As a fast, expensive, and fairly fragile model, the Pale Rider is a good target to focus on if he's caught out in the open. If you can catch it in range, you can probably kill it with about two to four attacks. Don't bother trying to lock him in place, though, since he can and usually will Push 10" every round, ignoring Disengaging Strikes. Remember that the Pale Rider is **Immune to Influence**, so any attacks resisted with Wp won't affect it.

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