First up, the lady herself. Colette is very much a tricksy one. With a little preparation on the Showgirls player’s part, it is almost impossible to kill Colette. She has a number of triggers which move her somewhere else as soon as she takes damage, and can do this even if she is killed (presumably with a puff of smoke and a merry “ta-dah!”). Her usefulness lies in her ability to make the rest of her crew even better at what they already do well: produce scheme markers and move around. Should you ever manage to isolate her from the rest of her crew, however, she’s toast.
Angelica is the Showgirls Enforcer. She has similar effects to Colette, in that she allows friendly showgirls to be more mobile, but she also has a nasty defensive trigger that allows her to move an attacking model to any enemy scheme marker within LOS. Which could be very, very far away, in the wrong (right?) circumstances.
Cassandra is the Henchman, and does the usual Henchman trick of doing what the rest of the crew don’t. She’s pretty solid in close combat, and has the surprising ability to breathe fire. Coupled with her mobility she can get up close and in your face very quickly, causing a fair bit of trouble.
Performers are the standard grunts of the crew. They’re hardly hard-hitting, but are very slippery, able to do several useful things that most models can’t (producing scheme markers whilst locked in combat being a good example.) They can play around a little with enemy movement, and from time to time even poison them. Overall, though, they’re best used to drop scheme markers.
Mannequins are peons, meaning they don’t count towards objectives, and in fact can be used to fuel certain other models’ actions, destroying them in the process. They’re fairly sturdy, with good armour, so are generally useful for blocking enemy movement and facilitating scheme marker placement.
Coryphée are the killy variety of mannequin. Far more dangerous in combat, these two (and there will usually be two) are very fast and very dangerous up close. They’re also surprisingly hard to kill. The real danger comes from their ability to dance together, which combines them onto one base and turns them into a murder machine.
The Oiran is not technically part of Colette’s crew – she’s from the Ten Thunders faction. However, she is also a Mercenary, allowing non-Thunders crews to hire her for one extra SS over her base cost. This is good, as one of her characteristics is Showgirl, which gives her great synergy with Colette’s crew. Useful primarily for her trigger “No Witnesses” which prevents her attacker from attacking any Showgirl models. i.e. the whole crew. Other than that, she behaves similarly to the other Showgirls, with some movement/poison shenanigans.
Mechanical Doves are not usually purchased as part of the starting crew (although they can be). Instead, Colette pulls them out of her hat as the game goes on. They’re fast flyers which can either buff a showgirl or blow up an enemy. Basically flying bombs with perks.
So, there you have it. The Showgirls don’t win games by killing the opposition. They win by producing huge numbers of scheme markers, racking up VPs from mission objectives and staying the hell away from anybody who looks remotely dangerous. But watch out for the Coryphée and Cassandra.
ps - all these models, sans upgrades, come to 58 SS, but there will always be upgrades with this crew - they need them to set up a lot of their more useful triggers.
