Aristeia! - The Rivals - Laxmee

"MAYA HAS ITS OWN SPIRITS, AND I AM THEIR LAIBON."

People come in two flavors: those who use Maya, and those who understand it. Laxmee doesn’t just read Maya, she converses with it. She has that intuition. She can influence her teammates, or her enemies, with subtleness and discretion. Her programs are those little weights that end up tipping the balance in her favor.

The infohacker Laxmee conjures up programs like a Maasai laibon calls down the rains.

The Maasai were a tribe of proud warriors and hunters, but they were driven out of their native Africa and resettled aboard the Nomad mothership Corregidor. As a young girl of Maasai descent, Laxmee seemed doomed to feed the cycle of criminality plaguing Corregidorian youth, especially once she enrolled in one of the gangs vying for control over the more impoverished fringe sectors of the ship. One momentous day, her gang hit a supply barge moored on their turf and found a shipping container full of military equipment. When it came time to divvy up the swag, Laxmee ignored firearms and ammunition as soon as a particular piece of gear caught her eye: an honest-to-goodness infowar hacking device. But, by gang rules, everyone who wanted that piece would have to fight for it. Laxmee never backed down—she was too true to her Maasai heritage for that—and one by one the other contenders bit the dust, earning her the prize.

But the gang leaders didn’t realize the army would never forfeit that kind of materiel, and within hours they were in the custody of the military police. Laxmee had no illusions about her bosses’ ability to withstand a Corregidor-style ‘debriefing’, so she resolved to abscond with her toy rather than wait for the other shoe to drop. She stowed away on a random freighter and thus begun her journey across space stations and caravanserai the Sphere over, always carrying her hacking device, always a fugitive of the law.

Laxmee took to programming very soon, and her abilities grew as she met other underground hackers on her travels and constructed a network of contacts. Maya, the interplanetary data network, became her only true home. Soon, breaking encryptions and stealing secured data became routine. Using counterfeit qualifications, she was able to quit dock work and get herself a cozier job as IT at a recreational cruiser, which left her plenty of free time to moonlight as an information broker. Her new job also gained her access to multitude of high-value targets such as megacorp executives and travelers with suspiciously high-security comlogs. After getting the data, Laxmee only had to sit on it for a prudent amount of time before hawking it in the black market. It was a solid, profitable system, but the sensation of impunity was too heady for Laxmee, and she became overambitious.

One night in particular, she broke into a portable data vault owned by an eccentric-looking businessman. It was a clean job, quick and traceless, but then again all her jobs were clean. Only when she opened the decoy data did she realize her mistake, but before she could react the door came crashing down. A gigantic blonde marched into her cabin and pinned her against the bulkhead. The bogus businessman sauntered in after his associate, smiling appreciatively.

“Outstanding job, kid. My name’s Hannibal, as you might have deduced,” he said, nodding toward the screen. “I’ve been looking for someone with your kind of talent. I’m gonna make you an offer you can’t refuse.”

If you are a player who selects Aristos on the basis of their raw attributes then Laxmee is one who you would most certainly overlook. At best her Initiative, Movement and Energy are all average. She has a weak Defense and very low Health, she isn't offering much in the way of Brawn or Agility either. The best thing on offer here is the automatic Special result on her Agility, which can at least give her a movement boost if she does Disengage (but doesn't offer another opportunity to do so, remember that Movement Point will be lost with the rest if you fail) .

But, like all dedicated Support Aristos, it is in her Actions that she really shines. Like hEXx3r, her generic Switch gives her better mobility than is suggested at first glance. The ease with which she will hit this is, however, somewhat balanced by the fact that it is only of use during her own Activation and that it doesn't allow for avoiding Disengaging entirely.

D/BUff3r is at the heart of Laxmee's functionality as a support Aristo. At only one Action Point it's cheap to use and targeting opponents it can apply the Stunned State, or the Focused State on an Ally. With Range 0-5 it has solid reach, and as it does not require Line of Sight Laxmee can do her job without being exposed. Best of all she can also give herself a Focus (not useful here, as three Yellow dice are already involved, but perfectly usable elsewhere). With two Action Switches, one to apply Stunned to the opposition and one to apply Focused to an Ally, she has a reasonable chance to get a second effect in addition to a little over 70% of applying the selected State to the original target.

The other side of Laxmee is her State management. The first part of this is Purge '92, an Action with a one AP cost and the same no-LoF 0-5 range. This can benefit from the Focused State (as it's not already maxed on Yellow dice) and pulls a State token off the Target. Combine this with Fairy Dust to allow Allies to burn Focused tokens in order to remove States at the beginning of any Allied activation (important if you need to get rid of a Prysm Taunt before that Aristo activates, for example) and you have excellent control over States.

Laxmee brings the fairly typical mix of a couple of "selfish" and a couple of "generous" Tactics. Although the Support nature of her "selfish" Tactics does make that distinction seem fairly petty.

The first of these, "selfish" really only in terms of timing, is 4-Kaleidoscope. This applies the Stunned State to every opposing Aristo within range 1-7 without any need for LoS. While Laxmee likely needs to advance, with only moderate timing it's very unlikely that you'll need much effort to hit the whole opposing team. This allows you to focus Laxmee on buffing for a Round, while significantly impacting your opposition as a whole team.

Second, and probably the most feared of Laxmee's Tactics options, is the "generous" option, Atom. This makes one face to face roll into an almost automatic positive result for you by removing all the dice your opponent had except for a single basic die. This won't save you from truly hilariously bad outcomes, but it makes for a roll which is pretty much guaranteed to go your way. Obviously this is very useful offensively, but it can also be a fantastic defensive tool. If you draw your opponent into playing Tactics to add dice to their roll, especially by adding dice to yours first, then this can be a particularly devastating play.

Thirdly Laxmee offers the choice of the most effective state clearing Tactic in the game. While there might be some limited situations where Padre Mendoza's "Tabula Rasa" will be more effective (where your opponent also has Focus, and/or Bachmann stacking states on himself), most of the time "Team Reset" will offer the larger benefit, sweeping away the states on your team while leaving those which you have placed on the opposition in place. The only thing which makes this a marginal choice is Laxmee's existing suite of strong state clearing capabilities, which make it an unnecessary investment in many matchups.

Last we have another Tactic choice which is really "selfish" only by the strictest definition of timing. "Team Upgrade" allows you to drop a Focus onto every member of your team, no matter where they are in the Hexadome. While this can be effective, it often isn't necessary because Laxmee is pretty good at ensuring that her Allies will be focused when they need to be, and she will often do it incidentally while putting out Stunned onto enemy Aristos. However this can allow her to continue to offer effective support in turns where she is badly out of position, needs to focus on moving to score, or is returning from the bench.

Check out the video above, from Shameless Mayhem. They have an extensive range of videos on YouTube, of which their Aristeia 99 series is designed for newer players. They also regularly stream on Twitch, so be sure to check out one of their matches.

Obviously Laxmee, with her team buffing from Focus, enemy debuffing from Stunned and excellent State management, is an outstanding Support Aristo. The fact that she can perform these roles without requiring LoS helps to mitigate her fragility, although once she has those states out a trip to the Infirmary seldom seriously hurts her match. However she has a relatively strong secondary Scorer role, as she gains a lot of mobility from her Switch. She is especially effective in countering many other Support Aristos, as getting hit with Stunned has a disproportionate impact on Aristos who rely on hitting a single success off less than stellar odds than strikers who are likely putting out several. Team mates who use Special results to power Switches are going to be especially fond of Laxmee on their team, with Mushashi and Bill being two of the biggest benefactors.

When considering the Scenarios in which Laxmee is a strong pick, it's important to keep in mind that she is more mobile than the first glance might suggest. This means that she has more to offer in Assault or Scorched Earth than some might think. Of course, she does have a limited range, so Blitz or Conquest will be tougher and it's unlikely that she is going to be a great pick there. For damage focused Scenarios like Carnage she does have a lot to offer in terms of her support output, but obviously her vulnerability needs to be kept in mind and mitigated if possible.

Laxmee's greatest rival from the ranks of the Hyperpower is the slightly more offensive, but nevertheless dedicated, Support Aristo Eclypse.

Eclypse brings better attributes, especially in terms of her defense, but requires LoS for her abilities which does expose her to more risk.

Thanks to Black Lightning Eclypse has some strong damage potential, with Switches on both Successes and Special results offering access to Marked and Dazzled. Her Automatic Ability, Penumbra, allows her to get the Hidden state out on an adjacent Ally, further expanding her support capabilities.

However, the key aspect of her play function is in the Action Moon Cycle. This allows states on enemies and allies to be flipped, either back up (to keep them going) or down (to reduce their effect and step them towards elimination). The key limitations are the range and LoF requirement on the ability, and the simple fact that Eclypse has no inbuilt ability to mitigate her own states.

In terms of her Tactics Eclypse offers rangeless access to Marked and Hidden on a target, as well as the option to flip any number of states on a target. She can also allow you to Displace a target which is either Hidden or Marked (allowing use to replace an opponent or shift one of your own team).

Overall Eclypse is a slightly more aggressive Support Aristo than Laxmee, but offers a similar package of state effects and better defense. The real cost is her inability to protect herself from states well, and far less powerful Tactics.

Laxmee is one of the Aristos with the most singular focus. When you pick her you are taking a Support, and little else. However she brings good buffing, debuffing and state management, allowing her to act as a one-stop-shop for team support and letting the rest of the team focus on other roles exclusively.

For more info on this Aristo you can check out the official Corvus Belli In Depth article or check out the CB Forums for further discussion.


So, is Laxmee a favorite of yours?

How do you use her?

Let us know in the comments below, on the forum, or on Facebook.