Bringing the Thunder

Misaki hit the table for me for the first time last night.  My crew selection was limited by the models I had painted, which was less limiting than I expected it would be.  The only real limitations I ended up with was that I had no Ototo available, and I had only one Torakage.  I had Archers, Brothers, Shang, Yamaziko and a Torakage ready to roll alongside Misaki herself.

First, I have to say I’m not a huge fan of the models.  Misaki’s not quite as bad as I thought she would be, but she’s still pretty bad.  Shang, for a 30mm HT1 model, is quite a bit larger than he should be.  He’s leaning off the base nearly everywhere, and he’s taller than almost every other model I have in the crew.  Ototo I’m not as disappointed with as I expected to be, but he’s a little ridiculous leaping in the air as he hammers something.  One of the Torakage, the one with the long knives down his arms, looks fantastic.  The other two I don’t really like.  At least the Archers look good.

But I don’t play for the looks of the models as much as whether they’re fun on the field.  Misaki looks like she could threaten Lady J, the Viktorias, and Lilith for melee master of the game.  She’s got a few fantastic abilities stacked in her favor: four AP with which she can attack, Decapitate, Diving Assault, and You’re Mine.  After that she’s got Pilfer and Shadow to help her out.  She’s got a fantastic DF/WP combination of 7/7, has Bulletproof +2, and 10 wounds.  She’s got good CB and she’s got a nice damage progression (the only “bad” thing she has is that her minimum damage is only 2).

So how did the games go?

My first game was facing Hoffman played by Skill-less Brian.  He’s been trying to use Hoffman to get better with him, and this was his first time facing Misaki.  Hoffman hitched a ride up with a Peacekeeper, and Misaki Diving Assaulted the guy and killed him.

Rather than play out the game, we re-racked and tried a new match, this time with him being more conservative and using the damage train with the Guardian.  The game was much more interesting.

My Archers led my army, putting Slow on his constructs, but he managed to send the Warden after them and kill one of them.  Fortunately it was the one he had not taken Kill Protégé on, and Yamaziko helped shield him and heal him back up.  Meanwhile Misaki used Diving Assault to get into range of the Guardian, Peacekeeper, and Hoffman.  She used Decapitate on the Guardian straight away and then started working on Hoffman.  Meanwhile, my remaining Archer ran for the hills as Yamaziko moved in to lend a hand where she could.  She died to the Brutal Effigy while Shang died to the Warden (though he nearly killed it.

My Torakage popped up past the battle and ran for the Stake a Claim / Breakthrough schemes I had set while Misaki managed to kill off Hoffman, though she was knocked down to below half and lost all her stones defending against the Peacekeeper and Hoffman’s exploding discharges.  Finally Misaki killed off the Warden and Hunter and held the Brutal Effigy and Peacekeeper at bay as the game ended.  She managed to take the win that time too.

The third time I played, I brought a 25 stone list against Slaz and aRamos (you know how I feel about that guy).  I took Yamaziko, Torakage, and two Archers against the aRamos machine.

The game started out well for me.  My Archers were picking off his models and the Torakage was jumping them in and out of trouble.  On turn two, Misaki dove into Johan and killed him off.  I was a few inches out of getting at Ramos before he manifested.  Ramos manifested the next turn and it would be the last time I got initiative until the end of the game.  aRamos and Misaki went back and forth for a while, but aRamos managed to kill her off.  Meanwhile, one of my Archers died but the other and Yamaziko killed off all the remaining minions leaving aRamos alone.  He tried to summon new models but every time he did, either Yamaziko or the Archer would kill them off before they could do much.  The Archer kept aRamos slow, but couldn’t do much damage to him.  Finally by the end of the game we settled on a 2-2 tie as we both got Kill Protégé and nothing else.

After the games, Bill was asking me a few questions about Misaki to see what I thought.  He asked if, with everything she could do, I ever felt Misaki didn’t have enough AP.  I replied that I’d always take more AP, but that almost every turn she was doing something pretty similar: Diving Assault in, attack, attack.  Or attack, attack, attack, attack.  Once she mixed it up by using Pilfer before attacking to get a stone to use on the attack.  But overall, I never felt like I had more to do with her that I didn’t get to do, except attack more things.

Misaki’s a brutal master.  I’d be interested to have her face off against a Lilith or Lady Justice to see how she settles in that kind of match.  I think given the low wounds of the Vikis and the high speed of Misaki, she might have an advantage, but really it probably comes down to who gets their long-ranged kill shot off first.  I think Misaki’s going to vault up near the top of the 10 Thunders masters and be a challenge to figure out a solid way to defend against an assassination run when she’s on the table.