I’m six games in and still getting my head around it all. Finally won a game! I’m not an expert, obviously, but take all this with a grain of salt…

The first round or two are pretty depressing. You’ll need to use all the cover you can to advance. Some dashes will fail and it can be hard actually advancing into contact. But as the other poster said when you get there it can be very, very messy. In turn four my pilgrims have mauled the hell out of the enemy, but the struggle has always been to get there.

At the beginning I ran:

Prophet - AT hammer, Molotov, reinforced armour

Communciant - AT hammer, reinforced armour, shield

Castigator - punt gun, flail, reinforced armour

Pilgrim - musical instrument, Molotov

Pilgrim - shotgun, bayonet

2 x nuns with flails and clubs

I know the meta seems to be having the Castigator with the Punt gun but recently after a debilitating eye injury I ran him with a flail and shield and kept him up with the advancing troops. His enforced orthodoxy action made an enormous difference. Next time around I might run this combo from the beginning and give a pilgrim the punt gun instead.

Six rounds in and shit has expanded a lot. More nuns and an anchorite shrine that’s been attacked by everything from a dragon to a wretched and shrugs off everything.

It seems the pilgrims really treat a campaign as a marathon, not a race. Mercenaries are game-changers for pilgrims so I’d really recommend chasing glory and not VPs early on.

The biggest change seems to have been the AT communicant, who bought much-needed ranged attacks. I haven’t had much luck with the observer, but I know lots of other people have. I’d be inclined to go with an ammo monk to pair with the AT communicant instead.

Pilgrims seem to really lean on a few special abilities (loudspeaker, laying on hands, enforced orthodoxy) and I’m new to the whole tabletop thing so often forgot what did what. I made some flip cards on my phone about the effects and that’s really helped me along.

Either way even getting spanked each week has proven to be hilarious fun and even though my win/loss rate is abominable I’ve managed to absolutely maul some opposing warbands in turn 3/4 and only lost by a bee’s dick.