Cultist Lackey

The Cultist Lackey is the basic foot soldier of Johnny's cult, found in The Bunker, The Rift, and The Lab. With 20 HP and a melee throw that hurls struck units across the battlefield, it is not especially dangerous on its own — but it is a vessel for much worse things. A Lackey that secures a kill promotes immediately: kills earn it Zealot status, picking up a Bishop Hat transforms it into a Bishop, and exposure to Toxic Waste, mini-nukes, or Atomic Kitten radiation mutates it into a Cultist Mutant.

The throwing attack is primarily a positioning tool, displacing your cats and breaking formations. The Lackey itself deals moderate damage, but every kill it lands snowballs the fight. Low-HP familiars like Fleas or Rot Flies are especially dangerous to have on the field — a single swipe can one-shot them and hand the Lackey a free promotion into a Zealot, who then begins scaling damage each turn.

Against Cultist Lackeys, deny promotions aggressively. Keep your fragile familiars away from the front line, remove or destroy any Bishop Hats before a Lackey can pick them up, and avoid using Atomic Kitten near a group of Lackeys. AoE attacks that clear multiple Lackeys before any single one scores a kill are ideal. If you can thin them out before any promotion fires, the encounter becomes significantly more manageable.