Hey I'm looking into malifaux, and the arcanists have caught my eye, especially the steampunk guys and the showgirls, just looking for info for how they play and how the diff factions are better, cheers
uh... let me try and explain the Arcanist faction...
1. the masters have little or no synergy towards each other (esp with regard to Arcanists minions). Other factions usually cross "hire" similar minions within the faction... Arcanists almost has none of this.
2. you mentioned showgirls (Colette) and steampunk guys (Ramos?). both are extremely different... Colette is regarded highly because she is more "competitive".
3. Kaeris was probably included to the Arcanists faction because most of the faction is S - L - O - W. They probably wanted to stuff her into the Outcasts faction but they are already rather bloated...
4. Malifaux is rather hero- centric (in this case, master-centric) the games usually evolve around how the minions are able to interact with the master. also, the game is extremely objective driven... you can win games despite losing your master or even losing all your models!