Battle Report Zoraida vs. Tara - 45ss

Game Size: 45 stones
Deployment: Standard
Strategy: Turf War
Scheme Pool: A Line in the Sand, Distract, Deliver the Message, Assassinate, Entourage
Crews:

 
Zoraida

 - Crystal Ball

Barbaros

 - Nexus of Power

Bad Juju

Silurid

Doppleganger

Terror Tot

Terror Tot

     6 soulstones

Tara

 - Obliteration Symbiote

 - Dead of Winter

 - Knowledge of Eternity

Nothing Beast

 - Voiceless Words

Karina

 - Long Forgotten Magics

Void Wretch

Void Wretch

Death Marshal

Death Marshal

     7 soulstone

Schemes Chosen:
Zoraida: A Line in the Sand (Announced); Entourage: Barbaros (Announced)
Tara: Deliver the Message (Hidden); Entourage: Tara (Hidden)


Initial Plans:
I wanted to use the Doppleganger.  I didn’t care if it was a good choice or not for the game, I wanted to use it.  I wasn’t too fond of it during the playtest, but it got a couple of buffs during the last revision and I wanted to try it out.

I went without the Hex Bag for Zoraida mostly to save soulstones, though I think that’s a mistake.  The Hex Bag is really good for her – giving her a useful (0) that she wouldn’t otherwise get to use.  I don’t think I’m going to find a game that I won’t use that for her in the future.

I stacked up Barbaros to make him really hard to take down with Nexus of Power and set him aside to get Entourage, and then had my Tots set up to get Line in the Sand.  I used the Doppleganger, Silurid, Bad Juju and Zoraida to clog up the middle as best I could. 

 Turn One:
Zoraida: 0 VPs, 6 Soulstones
Tara: 0 VPs, 7 Soulstones
Initiative: Tara wins, Zoraida goes first

Turn Summary: I was playing like a deer in the headlights.  Tara does a lot of things, and I wasn’t sure what to expect from her.  She activated early, got reactivate, and had a Death Marshal bury the Nothing Beast.  I played cautiously, sending Terror Tots and Barbaros around the flanks, and the Doppleganger up the middle.  Zoraida went and moved Juju and the Silurid up a little before following them.  Soon enough, though, I could see that the Nothing Beast was going to come in and wreck some face if I didn’t distract it.

So I sent the Silurid leaping down the field and charged Tara to put some wounds on her.  Probably a mistake, as she was able to unbury the Nothing Beast and give it Fast.  The Nothing Beast immediately activated, not counted as its activation for the turn, and attacked the Silurid.  I knew if I let the poor guy go, I’d probably be in danger of the Nothing Beast wrecking me, so I cheated to keep it alive after all the attacks.  On the real activation of the Nothing Beast, it killed off the Silurid and looked down the field, hungrily.

End of Turn: Nothing happened.

Turn Two:
Zoraida: 0 VPs; 6 Soulstones
Tara: 0 VPs; 6 Soulstones
Initiative: Zoraida wins, Zoraida goes first

Turn Summary: I wrestled whether I should go first or second and decided to go first.  I knew I wanted to get the Nothing Beast away from Tara and out of the lines, so I had Zoraida Obey it to come forward, then had Zoraida Obey Bad Juju twice to move him into melee and attack the Nothing Beast for a wound.  Tara activated and gained Reactivate, gave Fast to a bunch of models (including Bad Juju), then gave Juju Slow to cancel the Fast.  I activated Juju, worried he wasn’t long for the world, and used Flurry.  Unfortunately Dan had used so many cards already that the Nothing Beast’s defense was up to 7 and I only hit him for a couple more wounds.  The Nothing Beast went after Juju and nearly killed him.

I looked over the board and knew I was not going to do well if I let Tara reactivate to give the Nothing Beast another round of beat-down.  So I had the Doppleganger move up, Mimic Pine Box from the Death Marshal, and then buried Tara.  That eliminated the reactivation, which eliminated the Nothing Beast’s extra activation, and also eliminated the chance for Dan do reactivate Tara next turn.  If I could keep the Doppleganger alive.  A well-timed Black Joker from the Death Marshal allowed her to survive.

Meanwhile, my Tots grabbed two objective points and Barbaros moved behind the lines to start working on a Void Wretch.  Activation Order was killing me.  One of Dan’s Void Wretches healed up Tara while she was buried.

End of Turn: We both got a VP from Turf War.

Turn Three:
Zoraida: 1 VP; 5 Soulstones
Tara: 1 VP; 5 Soulstones
Initiative: Zoraida wins, Zoraida goes first

Turn Summary: I needed a dead Nothing Beast.  Bad Juju activated and swung at the Df3 monster three times, killing him with the final swing.  The Doppleganger died to an onslaught from a Death Marshal and Void Wretch.  Meanwhile, both of my Tots grabbed more Scheme Markers along the middle while Barbaros knocked the Wretch down to 1 wound.  A Marshal killed one Tot and Katrina left the other one with two wounds left.

Zoraida managed to kill off one of the Death Marshals by summoning a Voodoo Doll on it, then smacking the Voodoo Doll for enough wounds to kill it, but we both still had enough in place to get our VP for Turf War.  The Void Wretch moved up on Zoraida along with Tara.

End of Turn: We both got a VP from Turf War.

Turn Four:
Zoraida: 2 VPs, 4 Soulstones
Tara: 2 VPs, 5 Soulstones
Initiative: Zoraida wins, Zoraida goes first

Turn Summary: Who cares whether Dan gets a (+) on Initiative when I’m flipping 12s and 13s?  The Terror Tot charged Karina, dealing a couple wounds.  Dan decided not to activate Tara first, instead grabbing the sure VPs from the Void Wretch delivering the message to Zoraida.

Barbaros smacked Karina, killing her off.  The Void Wretch on that side of the board killed off the Tot, which in turn bled on it to deal its last wound, dropping both of us out of Turf War territory. 

End of Turn: Nothing happened.

Turn Five:
Zoraida: 2 VPs, 4 Soulstones
Tara: 4 VPs, 5 Soulstones
Initiative: Zoraida wins, Zoraida goes first

Turn Summary: Zoraida started off by killing off the Void Wretch, leaving Dan without enough models to take Turf War unless he gave up Entourage.  Tara gained Reactivate and then booked it to the end of the board.  Barbaros did the same thing, and the Death Marshal moved up and destroyed one of the Evidence markers, dropping me from 3 points for the scheme to 1.

End of Turn: Nothing happened.

We flipped and the game did not go on.  If it had, I had a decent shot of pulling out a victory, I think.  Zoraida could have moved to the middle with three AP and dropped a scheme marker, and there was not a marker in range for the Marshal to destroy in one activation.

Final Score:
Zoraida: 6 (2 Turf War, 3 Entourage, 1 Line in the Sand)
Tara: 6 (2 Turf War, 2 Deliver the Message, 2 Entourage)

I was very lucky in that Dan didn’t announce his schemes and denied himself two possible VPs.  If he had announced even one of them (probably wouldn’t announce Deliver the Message, though Entourage was a good choice to announce), he would have won the game.

I had a lot go my way – winning initiative nearly every turn, having Dan get the Black Joker a couple of key times (keeping the Doppleganger alive on turn 2, and forcing the Nothing Beast to waste its second activation killing the Silurid on turn 1).

Tara’s a scary beast.  She actually reminds me a little of Zoraida.  She can trade her activation for activations for other models.  She can lead things off by gaining Reactivate and moving up, having the Nothing Beast buried, and then at the end of the turn move up and unleash him, giving the Nothing Beast the activation from him…

Wait a second, I just read the abilities.  Dan’s a cheating whore!  You don’t get two activations out of friendly models at all!  Obliteration Symbiote has two abilities – one is a (2) that lets a model be unburied and activate, but doesn’t count as the model’s activation for the turn.  This ability requires an enemy model to work.  The second one is a (1) that lets a model unbury but can only activate if the model can still activate, and counts as the model’s activation for the turn.  You can’t double-activate the Nothing Beast or the like.

On the other side of the field, the Doppleganger was actually clutch to this game.  I am still not sold on it, but I love the sideways-ness of it.  It was able to hold off the assault for a turn in order to let me slow the bleeding.

I’m not sold on Bad Juju the way I’m using him.  I wanted him to be a front-line hitter too much, and he’s not survivable enough for that.  I think I need to partner him with another hitter.  Barbaros could have filled that role, but I needed to keep him safe and alive for Entourage.  I think in retrospect, I would have been better swapping the Silurid for Baby Kade to give a little more hitting power.  It was something I really felt I lacked once Bad Juju was dead.

Figuring out how to target Tara’s army is going to be clutch.  Katrina should be an early target, I think.  Not because she’s overly great – but she’s an easy kill and has a solid potential for damage.  The Nothing Beast (or whatever is used for killing) needs to die quickly.  And the Void Wretch.  I don’t think there are going to be a lot of these guys on the table, but if your opponent gets good at burying/healing its models, those guys have to go.

Overall, it was a fantastically entertaining first game.  Looking forward to the rematch, Dan.  (You cheating whore.)

Weekend Tournament

It has been about six months since my last tournament.  I have been having a very busy time at work these last few weeks, and this past Saturday was the first day off I had in over two weeks.  I figured I'd sleep as long as I wanted, and if I woke up in time for Bill's tournament, I'd head out for it.  Well, I woke up in time.  Still exhausted, but I have a hard time falling back to sleep in the mornings.

I couldn't figure out what crew to bring.  I had Guild and 10T that I had been playing a lot recently.  I figured it would be fun to try something different, so they both sat home.  I considered going back to Neverborn and taking a mix of just Lilith and Jakob, but I wanted to bring my travel pack and the Hungering Darkness was too big to fit in that bag.  Same for my attempt to bring Izamu.  So I decided on Von Schill (which quickly turned in to the Viktorias when I realized I did not have enough models to field Von Schill alone at 30 or 35 points... where's the Strongarm Suit when you need it!).

So I packed my bag and headed out to Huzzah Hobbies for the tournament.  Chris, the store owner, pulled me aside and told me there would be a lot of ridicule if our store failed to win the "Best Store in NoVA" trophy and the "Best Store on the East Coast" plaque.

When I walked in the store, Dan was happy to see I made it, then asked what I picked to play.  "Viki

There were a lot of people showing up - 19 total.  We lined up for pairings as Bill read them out.

ROUND ONE - NAYTE (Victory Comics), 35 Stones
VIKTORIAS vs. aMcMOURNING, SHARED LINE IN THE SAND (new version)
 
I started at table 7 with Nayte from Victory Comics, a friend of mine I haven't played in months.  He set the tone for this being a casual tournament (which is exactly what I was hoping for - the bug of competition in Malifaux has been waning) by asking me if there was any Resser master I wanted to see or didn't want to see.  I told him I'd love to see Yan Lo since I hadn't played him much, but he seemed a little hesitant.  He had very little experience with the old man.  So I revised to say "no Kirai".  I was tired of playing her.  Not that I felt like I couldn't take her down (the Vikis are a great matchup against her), but I didn't feel like going through the slog.

So out came Avatar McMourning - a model I've seen played but never with the same skill that Nayte has with him.  I pulled out my basic 35 stone Viktoria crew and we were off.

My Crew: Viktorias, Student of Conflict, Von Schill, Freikorps Trapper, Convict Gunslinger, Ronin, 7 stones
My Schemes: First Blood (Viki-specific), Stake a Claim

Nayte's Crew: McMourning w/ Avatar, Chihuahua, Canine Remains x2, Belle x2, Crooked Man x2, Night Terror x2, Sebastian, 6 stones
Nayte's Schemes: Stake a Claim, A Piece for Me (McMourning-specific)

Before I go on, this games was something of a hilarity.  I was barely able to talk straight due to being exhausted and asleep on my feet.  Nayte, on the other hand, was jittery with several cups of coffee in him already.  I couldn't work up energy for the life of me, and he couldn't keep still.

Nayte was able to out-activate me early on in the game, but that would not last forever as he farmed his own dogs for body parts.  Having played as and against McMourning, I was pretty confident that First Blood would be easy to get.  Even if he forced me to fight for it by killing only one of his dogs early, I had enough guns to get the second kill quickly, I figured.

Sure enough, he killed off both dogs early, netting me my First Blood scheme, and then started going after the Line in the Sand markers.  I was in a spot of bother being outnumbered as much as I was.  I sent a Ronin after one of the markers opposite a Crooked Man, sent my Trapper after the Night Terrors (I figured shooting and then Repositioning forward would get me up the field, but in the first two rounds he missed all four shots, so I ended up just having him run up the field to get objectives).  Von Schill, the Convict and the Vikis held the center pretty well.  Von Schill got an early Red Joker kill off on a Belle, and soon the activation order was swinging my way.  Still, he managed to grab the Strategy points on turns 2, 3 and 4, giving him a 3-2 lead at that point.

During turns 3 and 4, I popped as many shots on McMourning as I could.  I didn't want the Avatar to hit the table, and I certainly wanted to deny him his scheme points since he had the advantage in Strategy.  While my Ronin was killing Sebastian (and getting knocked down to 1 wound remaining herself, though her DF8 was able to keep her alive the rest of the game), Von Schill and the Convict killed the summoned Rouge Necromancy while the Viktorias charged down the fleeing McMourning, pasting him.

Outnumbered now, my crew flipped the dynamite markers to the correct side and I gained points on turns 5 and 6 while I chased down and killed off his last two models.  Final score: 6-3.

ROUND TWO - ALEX (North Carolina), 30 Stones
VIKTORIAS vs. LEVITICUS, SHARED RECONNOITER (new version)

After a victory, I ended up on the second table.  I looked down the line and saw that the first table was Outcast vs. Outcast (Vikis vs. Hamelin - both of them had played Leviticus the first game).  The second table was Outcast vs. Outcast (Vikis vs. Leviticus).  The third table was Outcasts vs. Archanists (Gremlins) and the fourth table was Outcasts vs. Ressers (Gremlins again).  Neverborn overpowered?  I don't think so.

Of course, this could have something to do with the fact that only one Neverborn player was at the tournament, and there were seven Outcasts.

My Crew: Viktorias, Student of Conflict, Von Schill, Freikorps Trapper, Convict Gunslinger, 7 stones
My Schemes: Holdout, Bodyguard

Alex's Crew: Leviticus, Canine Remains, Collodi, Marionette x4, Wicked Doll, Watcher, 6 stones
Alex's Schemes: Soulless Life (Leviticus-specific), Breakthrough

Alex and I bantered a little and I learned that I have a new power in tournaments: being on a podcast can be used to intimidate other players.  (Well, only the ones that don't know me personally - once they figure out I don't know as much about the game as I pretend to, the intimidation factor drops to about zero.)  We were playing Reconnoiter and I could see my crew was starting out outnumbered 10-6 (after the Waif was placed on the board).

My goal was simple: kill either Collodi or Leviticus.  I figured with one of those two down, I could handle the rest of the crew.

I deployed with my Convict and Trapper on one side of the board, my Vikis on the other with my Student, and Von Schill ready to support either way.  I wanted to take out the Watcher first because it was the most autonomous model in his crew and I didn't want it to lock down his Breakthrough and deny my Holdout.  So the Trapper killed it, and then Von Schill killed the Steam-thing that Leviticus summoned out of it.

Collodi and his dolls started coming around the side of the board and on turn three, they launched themselves into my Sword Viki.  I had seven soulstones, and by the end of the massive onslaught, I was down to a hand of only 3 4's, 3 soulstones, and had taken 3 wounds.  My Viktorias responded in turn.  The Student of Conflict gave Fast to the Gun Viki.  The Gun Viki gave the Sisters a (+) flip to hit (with all the Marionettes out there, two of them Filled with Stones, I wanted to get as many Whirlwind attacks as I could).  She killed off a Marionette and knocked one with stones in it down to 1 wound.  The Sword Viki then went and killed off the other Marionettes, then sapped a few Soulstones from Collodi.

Meanwhile, Von Schill forced Leviticus back by killing the advance Waif after Levi killed my Convict Gunslinger.

The next turn, Leviticus got initiative.  Collodi activated first, making a new Marionette to get him out of dodge.  My Viktorias activated and killed off Collodi and the Marionette.  Levi went after my Gun Viki, but I burned my soulstones to keep her alive.  With Leviticus dead and a good hand of cards, it was my chance to take out Levi too.  My Trapper moved forward and shot one Waif through a window, killing her.  Von Schill jet-packed down the field and got one shot off on the second Waif, killing it too.  Collodi down, Leviticus down.  Over the next few turns I racked up the Reconnoiter points and pulled a win, 8-0.

ROUND THREE - DAN (Huzzah Hobbies), 25 Stones
VON SCHILL vs. VIKTORIAS, SHARED KING OF THE HILL (new version)

The final round had four players still undefeated.  The top two undefeated players faced for first place, and the bottom two undefeated players faced for second place.  Since we both brought the same crew, we decided to make the game a little more fun than just a mirror match.  We agreed to split the gift certificate no matter who won, and then made a deal for crew creation: since he had not brought all his Von Schill stuff, he would play Vikis with no Freikorps, and I would play Von Schill.

Of course, this meant I had no choice but to play his box set - the only Freikorps models I owned.  Still, it would be great to have a game that didn't come down to "who got the initiative".

My Crew: Von Schill, Freikorps Specialist, Freikorps Librarian, Freikorps Trapper, Freikorpsman x2, 3 stones
My Schemes: Breakthrough, Kill Protege (Convict Gunslinger)

Dan's Crew: Viktorias, Student of Conflict, Ronin x2, Convict Gunslinger, 7 stones
Dan's Schemes: Bodyguard, Eye for an Eye

Unfortunately, the game did come down to "who got the initiative" anyway, and Dan flipped a 13 on that one.  The round before, I had moved Von Schill up, taken a shot on one of the Vikis, and dropped 8 wounds on her.  She prevented 2 of them leaving her still alive.  She charged me and tried to kill me, but couldn't quite pull it off.  And my Librarian (and my fate hand) never saw a Ram after the first turn, so no healing.  Three stones are not much against an onslaught of Vikis.

Von Schill fell, then his Sword Viki fell.  His Gun Viki came in to kill a Freikorpsman, and my other one charged her (Red Joker in hand for damage that would kill her), got to the straight flip, and then flipped the Black Joker on damage.

It was mostly cleanup by then.  My Trapper managed to kill the Student of Conflict and Gunslinger.  Both Ronin were dropped to 1 wound, and then one sacrificed itself for two Soulstones which Viki used to create a new Viki out of the other one.

Overall, there were about six flips that I needed probably two or three to go my way during the game.  I got one of them (the Red Joker damage on the Viki with Von Schill) and it wasn't quite enough to push the game in my favor.

Still, seeing Von Schill's box set take the game that close against a tailored Viki crew was pretty awesome.  I think the Strongarm Suit is going to be a big help for the crew - giving them a melee option, finally.  I would have probably dropped the Specialist in favor of the Suit.  While the Specialist spilled out a lot of wounds when he detonated his pack, none of those wounds actually mattered since they didn't kill anyone, and I had pretty much no one left to capitalize on the wounded models.

Final score: 8-4


FINAL THOUGHTS

After not being sure I was going to go to the tournament and making a last-minute decision to go, and then picking up a crew that I hadn't touched in six months, I figure I did pretty well.  I went 2-1 with 18 total Victory Points and a +7 VP Differential.

Congrats to Dan on his victory!  He led the Huzzah Hobbies crew in keeping both the Northern Virginia and East Coast prizes in Huzzah.  We'll be working on another tournament in the near future to give other stores another chance to wrest the prize from our hands.

Battle Report: Jakob Faces Zoraida's Younger Self

Dan and I went by Bill's house to do some podcasting, and afterwords we decided we'd go ahead and grab a game.  Dan played Mei Feng against Bill's daughter, Bianca, who's learning to play Colette.  Bill and I faced off on the other table.  Bill had just commented that he was undefeated against me in 2013 and I felt that simply could not stand.  So I pulled up my bag (currently filled with Ten Thunders) and tried to figure what to take.  I decided against McHammish since I've been playing him almost exclusively lately.  And I've been watching a couple other people playing Jakob lately and forgot how much fun he was.  So out Jakob came.  We decided on 35 stones and went to town.

My Crew: Ten Thunders
List: Jakob, Hungering Darkness, Beckoner x2, Stitched Together x2, 10T Archer, Wastrel (Feather), 7 stones

Strategy: Supply Wagon

Schemes: Breakthrough, Spread Brilliance (I think that's what it's called - the HD-specific one)

Since I was playing the list as a 10T list, I felt like I had to take some things that wouldn't be available to Jakob in a normal Neverborn list.  I decided on taking a Wastrel and assigning him my Breakthrough objective, and then took an Archer to make my list more Ranged than melee.  It meant I had only one dedicated-melee model (the Hungering Darkness), but I felt the Stitched Togethers might do well there too since they're short-ranged, high-damage models.

Bill's Crew: Neverborn

List: Zoraida w/ Avatar, Nekima, Terror Tot x3, Desperate Merc x2, Beckoner, 7 stones

Strategy: Claim Jump

Schemes: Kill Protege (10T Archer), Stake a Claim

Bill went with a standard Zoraida grow list.  He also hasn't played Avatar Zoraida that much, so he wanted to give her a try too.

The board was set up with several large clumps of trees and tall structures to block LOS all over the place, but then also had smaller pieces of rubble that would give people places to grab cover as they advanced.  We flipped for deployment and got Corners with Bill deploying first.  He kept his crew a bit back from the front of the corners line, making sure I couldn't reach him as fast.

I deployed my crew up front since I figured I would want to be contesting him early and try to kill off as much as I could before he was able to bring the full weight to bear against me.  I didn't have anything as long-ranged as Lure to try to disrupt the growing, but I did have the Beckoners and Archers.  Bill didn't give me much of a chance to shoot down the Desperate Mercs with how they were deployed, though.

TURN ONE - ZORAIDA INITIATIVE

This turn started out pretty standard on Bill's side with a bit of preparing to grow.  The Desperate Mercs went into Defensive Stance.  Nekima cut herself for a blood, grabbed Masks for all the Tots' spells, and slashed each Merc dropping them to 1 life left.  Both Tots hit their targets and Grew to Youngers.  Then Zoraida Obeyed one of them to Mature.

Meanwhile, my crew was advancing and grabbing cover.  I put up some fog, but not as far forward as I should have (I was playing cautiously with my Stitched, not wanting them to get cut down too fast) and Zoraida was able to drop a Voodoo Doll on one of my Beckoners.  I advanced Jakob into melee with the Beckoner so that if she activated, the only thing she could attack would be Jakob.  Not ideal, but better than having her kill off my Archer.

Near the end of the turn, Bill advanced with his Beckoner and tried to cast Come Hither on one of my Beckoners.  He passed Irresistible, and then we realized that she was flipping at a pair of (-)'s because she was Brilliant.  It resulted in a failed cast, and my realization that I needed to kill his Beckoner right quick.  Huggy moved up twice, then cast his Obey-like spell on her, forcing the Beckoner to charge Huggy, though she did not do any damage.

At the end of the turn, Huggy sapped a wound off of Bill's Beckoner.

TURN TWO - JAKOB INITIATIVE

I started with Huggy again, killing the Beckoner in a single hit, and then trying to make the lone Terror Tot who had run up last turn run towards me.  Unfortunately I was out of range and wasted my last action as I just repositioned slightly.

Zoraida Obeyed my Beckoner to attack Jakob and she hit, but I prevented the wounds meaning Jakob didn't take any poison either.  Bill finally got his first Crystal Ball off to start getting towards manifesting, though it cost him a soulstone too.  Zoraida then cast Bewitched on the Beckoner, meaning she could not cheat for the rest of the turn.

I moved my Archer forward, cast Yojiro for more damage, and Focused a shot on the Terror Tot, hitting and then cheating a Severe in to bypass the hard cover's Armor bonus and kill the Tot anyway.  He used his Voodoo Doll to Obey the Mature to charge one of my models, just working on bringing the Mature up the field and into range.  Recognizing that my crew was pretty vulnerable to a Mature's assault, I tried to figure out what to do next.  I wanted my Stitched to kill him, I think, so I had to out-activate him.  Fortunately I had the model advantage.  I activated my Voodoo-Dolled Beckoner who took two wounds and she shot the Mature, hitting to give him Brilliance and reduce his Willpower by 1.  I shot again and did another wound.

Nekima and the Younger moved up while my second Beckoner shot Nekima twice, missing both times and my Wastrel moved out to be away from where I expected the Mature to land.  I wanted to keep him alive if possible.

Sure enough, after regenerating one for being close to Nekima, the Mature charged in at one of my Stitched Togethers and triggered Knock Aside, shoving my Stitched Together back and then trying to jump on my Wastrel.  I was able to hold him in place with my Huggy and Beckoner.  He turned to attack... something else (Jakob, maybe?) and didn't do any more wounds.

Bill was out of models, so my Stitched Togethers went to work.  The first one dropped him down to 4 wounds left after building my hand a little, and then the second one dropped him to one wound left and walked away after building my hand some too.  At the end of the turn, Huggy sapped the last wound off him and the Mature died.

TURN THREE - JAKOB INITIATIVE

I was starting to get a bit confident.  I had killed off three models without taking much damage back.  Plus, I just drew the Ace of Masks and Nekima was in range of Jakob.  I flipped, won initiative, and looked over the board.  I would have to hit all three times, I figured, in order to kill her.  I had two Severes and the 1M.  Jakob activated, ditched a card for a third action and started shooting.  I had to hope my stones would push me into straight-flip range since I knew it would take all three shots to kill her.  Two soulstones, two Severe cards, and the Ace of Masks later, I killed her on the last shot, leaving Bill with Zoraida, a Younger, and a Voodoo Doll.  It wasn't looking likely that I'd get Spread Brilliance.

The Zoraida Obeyed the Younger to charge into melee with my 10T Archer.  Both of our hands were depleted a bit from the fight between Jakob and Nekima.  He was able to use a mid-ranged Mask to get Flay, but then only got Weak on the damage, dropping the Archer to 1 wound remaining.  Zoraida then turned into a Raven and flew 20" on to the Stake a Claim and Claim Jump.

I had to figure out how to kill the Younger without spilling blood onto the Archer.  My only shot I could think of was my Stitched.  I had to move up within 6", got more cards from Gambler, and then tried to Gamble My Life with him.  I hit, but didn't get to the 7 wounds I needed.  The Younger activated and locked up two points by killing the 10T Archer, then charged my Stitched for 4 wounds, hitting the Rotten Contents trigger to put a wound on Jakob, the Poisoned Beckoner, and the Younger.

My other Stitched killed the Younger, then started moving towards Bill's Deployment Zone.  With Obey as an option out there, I would need two models to lock up Breakthrough, I figured.  The Wastrel followed him on foot.

Meanwhile, the Hungering Darkness started moving towards Zoraida.  My Poisoned Beckoner dropped to 1 wound remaining and tried to shoot Zoraida, but failed.

My last Beckoner tried to Focus a shot on her, but Zoraida used a Soulstone to push the duel beyond what I could hit.  At the end of the turn, Huggy sapped a wound off the Beckoner that had one wound and two Poison on her, killing her.  Poor girl.

TURN FOUR - ZORAIDA INITIATIVE

Zoraida activated and cast Crystal Ball, using Bayou Two-Card on the 11M initiative flip to get her second use of the spell.  She then Manifested, ending up on the Stake a Claim marker, but also in melee with the Hungering Darkness.  She put up the bubble that allowed her to cycle her hand when other people cheated or used Soulstones, then zapped my Beckoner with Pins and Needles, dealing 5 wounds and 2 poison to her while filling her hand up with 5 new cards.  Her last action was to try to Obey the Beckoner.  He used a moderate Mask and then a Soulstone, but I was able to resist with my 13.

I had my whole crew left to go since the Voodoo Doll died.  Jakob moved up twice and then cast Dead Man's Hand, forcing him to drop 3 (of his 10+) cards and getting a 3, 3, 5 for myself.  Yay.  I guess.  The Hungering Darkness attacked and hit aZoradia (he was running low on soulstones and I had a hefty pile left) cutting her wounds down by a bit and giving her permanent Brilliance.  I attacked again, but he used his Soulstones to push me out of range of hitting without flipping VERY well.

Meanwhile, one of my Stitched and my Wastrel moved into Bill's deployment zone while my last Stitched, not wanting to be used against my own crew with aZoraida's uber-Obey, ran and hid behind some terrain.

TURN FIVE - JAKOB INITIATIVE

I flipped a 12 and he flipped the Black Joker for initiative.  He had one soulstone left and decided not to risk it on the Initiative here.  (Turned out to be a bad idea, since his next two cards were 13s, but who could have expected that?)

I decided to activate both Jakob and Huggy together.  Jakob charged aZoraida and Bill thought for a while as to whether this was a ploy to force him to use his last Soulstone or not.  With Huggy staring down at him, he decided to hold his soulstone for prevention flips.  Turned out it was no ploy at all as I dropped the Ace of Masks for damage, then flipped another Severe for 8 wounds.  He had five left so it meant the only prevention flip that would work was the Red Joker.  Which, of course, he was holding in his hand.  So that wouldn't help.

The game wrapped up there.  Turn six involved me grabbing the Breakthrough and we tallied points.

FINAL SCORE:
Jakob 6 (4 Supply Wagon, 0 Spread Brilliance, 2 Breakthrough)

Zoraida 2 (0 Claim Jump, 2 Kill Protege: 10T Archer, 0 Stake a Claim)

I found Spread Brilliance to be an annoying scheme to try to achieve in this game.  I couldn't keep any of his minions alive (except maybe the Beckoner) without worrying about them becoming melee beat-sticks and wrecking my crew.  I didn't have enough Control aspects of my crew to really go for keeping models alive but not contained.  So that was two lost points straight away.  If I gave Brilliance to Zoraida, she could lose it by Manifesting (unless she was close to a Beckoner, but Bill knew that and wouldn't let that happen if he felt threatened by the scheme), and I couldn't give it to a Voodoo Doll because he'd just sacrifice it to make another one.

A fun game to get back to Jakob with.  Though I used Dead Man's Hand only one turn the whole game, and he killed two models by the end of the game with his hold-out pistol (Nekima and aZoraida).  Not his normal game.  I never saw the Red Joker in my hand, but the Ace of Masks on those two turns certainly made Jakob deal more damage than I intended to this game.

McHammish Rides!

I finally got my first two games of McHammish under my belt after getting him all painted up and on the table.  Both games were 30 stones.  This was the first time in months I’ve played more than one game of Malifaux at game night.  All it would take is the newest President, McHammish.

The first game was against Second Generation Awesome Dan’s new Yan Lo crew.  My stuff was painted and his was not.  More, he was proxying a model in his list (Toshiro).  How did the gaming gods look on my offering versus his?  Well, read on!

My Crew:  McHammish (Armor +2, Hunter, (0) action healing), Luna, 2x Guild Hound, 2x Wastrel (Feather, Blade), Sidir, 7 soulstones

My Strategy / Schemes: Plant Evidence, Breakthrough, Stake a Claim

His Crew: Yan Lo, Soul Porter, Toshiro, Niece, 10T Brother, Ashigaru x2, 8 soulstones

His Strategy / Schemes:  Contain Power, Kill Protégé (Sidir), Eye for an Eye

I could tell right as the game started that it had been a while since I had played Malifaux a lot, and had been even longer since I had looked over this crew.  I started out timidly, slowly moving my crew forward.

TURN ONE – YAN LO INITIATIVE

This turn was a lot of moving up cautiously and preparing to engage.  I didn’t really have a shot with Sidir or McHammish, so I kept them together and a little farther back as Dan moved Yan Lo and the Ancestors (that should be a band name) forward.  Once he was mostly activated out, I shot my two Guild Hounds along one side of the board near some terrain far from his troops.  Odds were good I would be able to tag two Plant Evidence points with them next turn.

TURN TWO – McHAMMISH INITIATIVE

Sure enough, I started out with my two Hounds.  The back one moved up next to a piece of terrain with On the Trail, tagged it, and then moved towards a farther back piece.  My other Hound double-moved to the farther back piece of terrain and ended up close enough to my first Hound to tag the terrain.  Two points down on the top of turn two.  Not bad.

He started moving some people, an Ashigaru and the 10T Brother, closer to get ready to hit my lines.  I was able to move McHammish up nearby and shot the Ashigaru with a Net Gun, but he cheated to make sure the guy did not get hit and take Slow.

My Wastrels moved around, the one with the Feather hanging back a bit and the one with the Knives moving forward.  Sidir moved up to within 8” of the Ashigaru and shot at him, doing a couple wounds.

TURN THREE – YAN LO INITIATIVE

Yan Lo moved out and shot at one of the dogs with Weight of Ages, knocking him down to one wound, then cast again, cheating and stoning to get the trigger.  The Black Joker came up on damage, though, and the dog survived.  I activated both my dogs and moved the wounded one out near the back.  The non-wounded one moved around and tagged the third piece of terrain.

Now with the dogs behind him, the 10T Brother used Run Through to hit the first one.  He killed him in one hit, then finished his move next to the second one.  No cheating could save either dog, and the 10T Brother killed them both, netting Yan Lo a couple of Chi to take Regeneration and start on the DF7.  Losing two models in a single activation hurt, but they had done their job, grabbing three of the four Plant Evidence points.  On my activation, I surveyed my options.  I really didn’t want to lose Harmless on my knife Wastrel, but it was the only model close enough to finish out my strategy, and I thought that would turn out to be worth the effort.  The Wastrel moved up and tagged the last objective marker.  I was working from a 4-0 lead now.  The only thing left was to take Breakthrough and Stake a Claim.

An Ashigaru moved up and charged McHammish, but missed even with the bonus flip from Toshiro.  I activated Sidir and took a Machine Gun shot on the other Ashigaru, knocking it down a few points.  The Niece tried to move his models forward but failed, and McHammish activated.  He attacked twice, killing the Ashigaru on him, and then turned his Net Gun on the other Ashigaru, giving him slow and stopping him from being able to put as many attacks on me.  Finally, he healed up a few of the wounds he had taken.  The Ashigaru charged McHammish and dealt another one wound.  Luna charged the Ashigaru and got a severe damage, killing him off.  Toshiro was swimming in counters, and Yan Lo’s Chi was doing pretty well.  He had the DF 7 by now, and was starting on the Path of Bone.

TURN FOUR – YAN LO INITIATIVE

Dan started having another of our friends, Jonas, cut and bless his deck here, and it really started working.  My cards went cold and his went hot.

He was able to kill off my Knife Wastrel straight away, grabbing more Chi and making Yan Lo a walking death-machine.  I was able to kill Toshiro before he used any of his counters.  The 10T Brother moved back up to the fight and engaged my other Wastrel, but he used his Feather to jump to the piece of terrain in his deployment zone.  Luna was killed and McHammish started taking a few hits.

TURN FIVE – YAN LO INITIATIVE

Jonas’ blessing of the deck continued to help.  Yan Lo activated and summoned Toshiro back near McHammish.  He had enough corpse counters out there to come back at full wounds.  Then he shot at Sidir a bit, killing him and grabbing two points for Kill Protégé.

McHammish activated and used Stunner on the Slow Toshiro, but the stone I used came up Black Joker and he resisted.  I tried again and hit, Paralyzing him.  Finally, he shot his net gun at Yan Lo, but the guy used a stone to make it miss.  I was trying to run him out of stones, so I was willing to take that trade.

Everyone else moved in on McHammish.  He weathered the storm of attacks pretty well but was almost out of stones at this point.  Meanwhile, the Soul Porter was moving back to kill off the last Wastrel.

TURN SIX – YAN LO INITIATIVE

Yan Lo charged McHammish and hit him, then hit him again.  I had McHammish fall off his horse and placed him outside the melee range of most of his models.  He got a few more shots off on McHammish but was unable to kill him.  McHammish tagged Toshiro with Slow and then moved away from the models near him, avoiding the free strikes.  He ended up behind a building so Toshiro could not move his friends towards any enemy models.

The Wastrel shot the Soul Porter but did not kill him, then shot again and Dan cheated to make sure he missed.

TURN SEVEN – McHAMMISH INITIATIVE

I pulled a fantastic hand this turn, finally making up for the rest of them.  The RJ, a pair of 12s, a 13 and a 10 rounded out the good cards.  McHammish moved towards the back, whipped the totem to death, and then moved back to hiding.  Yan Lo was the only model on his side with a shot at finishing off McHammish, but with no stones left on either side, it came down to cheats, and I had the Red Joker.  We flipped and the game ended.

Had there been another turn, there was nothing I could do to weather the storm that was coming.  That said, my army was not designed to survive long – it was designed to achieve objectives which it did.

FINAL SCORE:
McHAMMISH 8 (4 Plant Evidence, 2 Breakthrough, 2 Stake a Claim)

YAN LO 2 (0 Contain Power, 2 Kill Protégé, 0 Eye for an Eye)

My second game was against Skill-less Brian.  He and I have not had a chance to play in a long time, so we hit the table with 30 stones.  Even though I felt Sidir was a waste of space in my last list, I wanted to keep trying him out to see if I could get him to work.  Fortunately this time I flipped one of the few strategies I would actually consider him good for.

MY LIST: McHammish (+2 Armor, Hunter, (0) Heal Action), Death Marshall, Witchling Stalker, Brutal Effigy, Wastrel (knives), Sidir, 7 stones

MY STRATEGY / SCHEMES:  Supply Wagon, Holdout, Kill Protégé (Warden)

HIS LIST: Lady Justice, Witchling Stalker x3, Austinger x2, Drill Sergeant, Warden, 8 stones

HIS STRATEGY / SCHEMES:  Destroy Evidence, Breakthrough, Kill Protégé (Sidir)

TURN ONE – McHAMMISH INITIATIVE

Again, lots of moving around on the first turn.  Sidir went around a central building on the left, the Brutal, Witchling and Death Marshall went to the back of the building so they could go either way, and my Wastrel and McHammish went around the right.  He got close enough to fire a shot off on the Warden that had moved up, and hit, paralyzing him.

On his side, the Austringers moved up to a broken down wall for some cover near the center of his board with the Drill Sergeant next to them.  The three Witchling Stalkers went around opposite Sidir, and the Warden moved up to protect the Austringers.  Lady Justice finished things off by moving into charge range of McHammish.

TURN TWO – LADY JUSTICE INITIATIVE

Brian went with Lady Justice first and charged McHammish, swinging twice and hitting for a total of four wounds.  I moved my Brutal Effigy out to heal McHammish and cleaned off a couple wounds, but he got shot down by Austringers flipping like crazy.  I jumped my Wastrel into combat with Lady Justice and swung at her, but he threw a low Mask and stoned into a Riposte, killing the Wastrel in one hit.  Ouch!

Sidir moved up and leveled a shot on one of the Witchlings, killing him with his close-range shot, and put up Camouflage on himself.  My Death Marshall and Witchling moved around to help on the Lady Justice side.

McHammish finally went and burned through some more stones, dealing 3 wounds to Lady Justice and leaving her with about 3 stones remaining.

TURN THREE – LADY JUSTICE INITIATIVE

The woman took some swings and left me with a single stone and a dismounted McHammish.  Oh, yeah, he had the 11, 12 and 13 of Rams for his three hits.  Ouch.  McHammish replied in kind, swinging as best he could but after two swings, I had nothing to show for it except a Riposte that left me with 2 wounds remaining.  Knowing I was unlikely to survive the fight, McHammish used Desperation and swung three more times, finally killed Lady Justice on the third swing.  Both masters vanished from the board.

One Austringer shot my Death Marshall leaving her with two wounds, and she shot a nearby Witchling.  The second Austringer finished off my Death Marshall which used Slow to Die to finish off the Witchling that she had shot before.  The Warden came in and hit my Witchling Stalker who hit the Warden back for a point.  Sidir finished off the last Stalker on Brian’s side.

TURN FOUR – LADY JUSTICE INITIATIVE

The Warden killed off the Witchling Stalker finally, but Sidir moved up and took a shot, killing the Warden himself.  I put up Camouflage again and braced myself for shots from the Austringers.  Somewhere around the end of this turn, I realized Brian was giving the Austringers a +2 CB as though they were shooting from Lucius (since that’s how he usually uses them).  I asked if he had been doing that all game and he sheepishly said probably.  That turned the hit into a miss against Sidir.

TURN FIVE – McHAMMISH INITIATIVE

I went with Sidir (obviously) and moved up to the center of the board, and then healed myself.  I had 8 wounds left, and Camouflage put me at DF 7.  Not bad at all.  The first Austringer shot at me, hitting and flipping three moderates on the (-)(-) flip.  Shot again and hit and got another pair of moderates, dropping him down to two wounds left.  The other Austringer went and shot Sidir twice, finishing him off.

TURN SIX – McHAMMISH INITIATIVE

I had no models.  The first Austringer moved up and dropped off the Drill Sergeant next to the Wagon in the middle of the board, then moved on towards an Evidence.  The other Austringer moved twice towards another Evidence.  The Drill Sergeant dealt two wounds to the Wagon by cheating and then flipping a Severe on the damage.

Brian flipped a card… the game went on one more turn.  If it had ended here, I would have won 6-2.  Part of what I love about Malifaux is how drastically the points can shift if you're not careful.  Unfortunately, sometimes I fall victim to it too...

TURN SEVEN – LADY JUSTICE INITIATIVE

The Austringer closest to my deployment zone ignored the Evidence and went straight there.  The other one double-moved on to an Evidence marker, and the Drill Sergeant cheated a Severe to destroy the wagon.

FINAL SCORE:

McHAMMISH 2 (0 Supply Wagon, 0 Hold Out, 2 Kill Protégé)

LADY JUSTICE 4 (0 Destroy Evidence, 2 Kill Protégé, 2 Breakthrough)

 

Finally, after over a year of playing, Skill-less Brian got that monkey off his back and defeated me.  Now I have to think of a new nickname for him since he has now defeated Bill, eChris and me.  Suggestions?