Malifaux game, 11/2/17

Rob and I played Malifaux last week, our first game since quite possibly 2013, during first edition. The last two or three months, I had started looking at the second edition models and rules, and have been eager to play, bringing it to our gaming weekend. Well, I finally got a chance!

I decided to play Neverborn, as I've been building the plastic crews from Wyrd miniatures to replace my old metal ones. I actually have been basing my purchases and list building for the moment on the Building on a Budget article over at Schemes and Stones, as I wanted to get some new miniatures for a fresh start, and this gave me a cost effective way to go.

We generated our strategy and schemes a few days before the game- our strategy was Reconnoiter, where we needed to get bodies in the different corners of the map. Our schemes were A Lind in the Sand, Outflank, Frame for Murder, Assassinate, and Protect Territory. With Reconnoiter, I knew I needed some speed to ensure I could get to the various table quarters, to claim or contest them as needed. Because of that, I went with Lilith. The list I took (from the above link) was:

(1)Lilith — 7ss
+Beckon Malifaux – 1ss
+On Wings Of Darkness – 1ss
+Aether Connection – 1ss
(2)Cherub – 3ss
(3)Barbaros – 10ss
+Fears Given Form – 1ss
(4)Doppleganger – 7ss
+The Mimic’s Blessing – 1ss
(5)Terror Tot – 4ss
(6)Terror Tot – 4ss
(7)The Illuminated – 7ss
(8)The Illuminated – 7ss

I played a decent amount of Lilith in first edition, and although she has changed some, her core 'feel' certainly seems the same- lots of mobility, good defense, and can hit hard. Barbaros seems to fit much of the same role, although he has to deal with the terrain that Lilith can basically ignore.

With this list, I felt pretty confident I could do any of the schemes. I didn't want to do Frame for Murder, as I don't want to depend on my opponent to do anything, so I didn't consider that. I ended up going with Assassinate, because killing Rob's Master would be something I'd like to do anyway, and Outflank, because going to those outside board edges gives me some flexibility when dealing with the strategy.

Rob showed up, and I set up terrain, as he revealed he'd be playing with Mei Feng, an Arcanist Master who he liked a lot in first edition that could get up and get physical as well. I don't know the specific content of his list, but I know it was at a minimum Mei Feng, Kang, Emberling, 3 Rail Workers, Metal Gamin, and a Rail Golem. I don't know the upgrade loadout, however.

We flip for deployment, deploy, and get ready to go (neither of us reveal our schemes).

We took turns placing terrain, not paying much attention to its upcoming effect on the game, but one thing to note is the large forest in the middle. Because of its size and position, it ended up being a MAJOR factor in the game, as Lilith doesn't struggle with it, but Rob's forces do (I swear, it wasn't intentional).

For deployment, Rob deploys centrally, I split my forces around the big rock formation.

Deployment

For Turn 1, my split forces run to the left and right, figuring that I can attack the middle as needed, and use my speed to choose how I'm going to engage the oncoming Arcanists. I start dropping some scheme markers randomly, to make it look like I might be going for Protect Territory (I don't think Rob buys it). Rob moves straight towards the middle.

End Turn 1. I get up the board quick, and drop some random scheme markers

Turn 2, I win initiative, and elect to have Rob go first so I can respond to whatever he does. For the most part, Rob moves everyone near the center, into the forest, but sends an Emberling and a Rail Worker on my side of the board. I end my turn with Lilith, who hops out, kills the Emberling, and retreats behind the building, where Rob can't get to her. Elsewhere, I push up the board to get some bodies near the middle.

End Turn 2

Turn 3, I look through my cards, read Wicked Vines, and an idea forms. I win Initiative, and attempt to enact it, and I Vine the Rail Golem, as well as a Rail Worker approaching on my right. I end Lilith's activation by clogging the far side of the board with a summoned forest, blocking Rob's charges into my Neverborn on that side. I use the Illuminated and Cherub on my right to kill the Vine'd Rail Worker.

Rob tries to determine a way to keep the Rail Golem free from Lilith's vines, and Vents Steam near it, to give me a negative flip when I try again.

End of the turn, I have bodies on every quarter, and Rob is too close to the center to get enough bodies in two quarters, giving me my first victory point.

End Turn 3

Turn 4, I cheat to get initiative (thanks to the Doppleganger), and immediately activate Lilith. I Focus, then hit him with the Wicked Vine, and nab him. Kane kills the Terror Tot near the center of the table, and I send Barbaros into Kane, dealing only two damage.

Barbaros on the attack!

Rob activates Mei Feng, attempting to figure out some way to create a push to free the Rail Golem, but fails on the attempt, and concedes, as things were definitely not going his way. Victory to Lilith!

Post-game, we talked a lot about things. The forest definitely was a tremendous challenge for him, but even so, there were a lot of things we overlooked that could've helped him. Using scrap tokens to Rail Walk with Mei Feng, and noticing that the Rail Workers are Constructs would both have helped. Also, he could've vented Steam multiple times in a turn, to make it extremely difficult for me to use the vines to stop his game plan. A few changes in upgrades may have helped as well.

Anyway, I had a blast playing, and look forward to doing so again. Rob sounds interested in trying again as well, so hopefully in two weeks we'll get it on the table again.

Assembled more minis! [Malifaux]

After so long making any progress on miniatures, I have to admit, it feels good to have so many new miniatures put together in a relatively reasonable amount of time.  Once again, my new additions are for my Neverborn crew.

Not a terribly great picture, but I haven't done much work on these minis.  That is the Mother of Monsters box (Lilith's crew), as well as a Doppleganger.

No that I have a full, legal crew for Neverborn, I feel a bit more comfortable in actually trying to put my own touch on some of the other minis I get.  I have an unassembled Pandora box, as well as a Nekima, which I may start working on, and doing some of my own modeling with, but I may wait until after I get some Company of Iron stuff done.

Also, multiple times in the past week, I sat down with the intent to paint, but I don't seem to have an appropriate way to prime my models.  Once I find a suitable box, maybe I'll start getting some painting done!

Holy cow, I assembled minis!

Yeah, it's been a long time since I've actually put together some miniatures... but I managed to get a few together this week!

That's the Jakob Lynch crew for Malifaux.  We actually have a Jakob Lynch player in the local meta, but since I play Neverborn, I figured I'd grab him and add him as well.  Overall, the plastics are pretty good quality. 

I have a big gaming weekend coming up, so look for updates soon!

Hobby progress for March, 2013

This month:

Malifaux:
* Re-based Neverborn Malifaux Cherub.

Warmachine/Hordes:
* Unit of Cryx Necrosurgeon and Stitch Thralls assembled
* Unit of Cygnar Mechanics assembled
* Unit of Cygnar Long Gunners + UA Assembled
* Cygnar Black 13th assembled
* Cygnar Journeyman Warcaster assembled
* Taryn di la Rovissi assembled
* Rhupert Carvolo, Piper of Ord assembled
* Bull Snapper assembled
* Skorne Cyclops Shaman assembled
* Sylys Wyshnalyrr assembled
* Anastasia di Bray assembled
* Orin Midwinter assembled
* Eiryss, Mage Hunter of Ios assembled

Malifaux Battle Report, 2/6/13, Sonnia vs Mei Feng

Rob finally got the opportunity to break out his new Mei Feng crew last month, and challenged me to a game.  Clearly terrified of my Lilith crew (he insists he thinks Lilith would be too easy for him to beat, but I know the truth ;) ), he suggested I take Sonnia, so I did so. We ended up playing a 30 Soulstone game, as well, since I was a little limited in my model selection for the moment.

To start with, my crew:
Sonnia Criid -- 6 Pool
Francisco Ortega
Samael Hopkins
Watcher
Witchling Stalker
Witchling Stalker
Witchling Stalker

I don't really have a lot to say about my list- it's her starter box + Fransisco (I figured I could use some extra ranged options) + a Watcher (to help offset bad luck).

Rob's crew:
Mei Feng -- 8 Pool
Emberling
Kang
Metal Gamin
Rail Worker
Willie, the Demolitionist

Admittedly, although I've read the Ten Thunders book, I only had a minimal amount of knowledge of what all the models did.  I did know Mei Feng could combo a lot, however, so I needed to keep an eye out for that.

After flips, we ended with Shared Claim Jump as our Strategy (whoever had more models within 3" of a counter in the center of the table scored points).  We each had two Schemes, which we both announced: I chose Bodyguard (Sonnia) and Raid.  Rob chose Bodyguard (Mei Feng) and Grudge (Fransisco).  We deployed in the corners, and the only thing notable about our terrain was that there was a lot of buildings.

Turn 1:

I win Initiative, and basically move everything towards the center.  I send my Witchling Stalkers forward as a sort of picket line, hoping to create a wide area of Disrupt Magic auras everywhere.  The rest of my models end up moving behind them.

Rob's activations involve Willie using Clear Out off Kang to move everyone forward a few inches, but Rob basically decides he had screwed up his deployment, and ends up just moving everything towards the center instead of more fanciness.

Turn 2:

Rob wins Initiative, even though I start by flipping a 12 (he manages to flip a 13).  Grrr!

Willie starts off the turn by double walking towards the middle of the table, to catch up to the action.  In addition, he puts a bomb up close to my forces.  I respond by having the central Witchling Stalker use Defensive Stance and his Disrupt Magic aura before moving a little towards the middle, hoping to make life a little difficult for Rob's force.

Rob activates Mei Feng and the Emberling next.  The Emberling walks up and tries to throw up a Vent Steam... but is sadly is in range of the aura, and fails.  Mei Feng is able to move up, stay out of the aura, and cast it, however, providing her with some protection.  I respond... by having my Witchling Stalker on my side of the building do the exact same thing as his brother.

Rob has a Rail Worker move in front of Mei Feng, presumably to block line of sight to her.  I activate my Watcher, who lets me look at the top two cards of my deck.  One of them happens to be the Black Joker, which I gladly throw on the bottom of my deck.

Rob parks his Metal Gamin next to Mei Feng.  If only I had decent blast shots!  I have my last Witchling Stalker do the same thing as his buddies, creating quite the area of magicless-ness.

Kang ends up going after the closest Witchling Stalker to me, but with Defensive Stance up, isn't able to put shovel to flesh.  Finally, given that I have all the activations left in the round, I attempt to go a little offensive.  Sammael starts taking shots, and manages to kill Willie, who unfortunately explodes, damaging the two closest Witchling Stalkers and Fransisco for two.  Fransisco follows up by firing at the Rail Worker, doing a few points of damage.

Sonnia spends the turn... basically doing nothing.  I don't know that I have a good early game plan for her, haha.

Turn 3: 

Rob wins Initiative again.

Rob starts by having his Rail Worker charge a Witchling Stalker, and detonates the previously placed bomb, killing the two central Witchling Stalkers, himself, and Fransisco.  That is really really unpleasant.  Needing to delay for an activation, to get his guys into range, I have my remaining Witchling Stalker use Defensive Stance, Disrupt Magic, and have him take a swing at Kang, dealing two damage... which doesn't really matter since he recovers from it whenever he activates.

Rob's Metal Gamin activates, and double Walks over to my side of the board.  I use the Watcher to move forward and help prepare my deck for the inevitable- revealing a 13, which I leave on top of my deck.

Rob then activates Mei Feng and the Emberling.  The Emberling walks up and Vents Steam, just staying out of the Disrupt Magic aura.  Mei Feng walks forward, casts Iron Skin on the Metal Gamin, and walks again.

I start salivating, hoping to put a ton of damage on Mei Feng.  Eagerly, I activate Sammael, and declare I'm going to Rapid Fire, and make the first flip... then remember that I haven't used his Flaming Bullets spell.  I also forget about his Arcane Hunter ability (so a net +2 Cb and +3 Dg I screwed myself out of).  As it was, Rob is forced to spend a few Soulstones, but even so, I still put 2 damage on him.  Honestly, had I remembered to use these, it would've probably cost him another Soulstone, which may have made a significant difference.

Sonnia ends the turn by activating, and throws a bunch more spells at Mei Feng, which force her to spend MORE Soulstones, but I still end up putting another two damage on her.



Turn 4:

I thankfully win Initiative.

For some reason, I activate Sonnia first, even though Sammael could've either killed Mei Feng, or forced her to spend every Soulstone she had.  I don't really remember why I did this.  Regardless, Sonnia starts throwing spells at Mei Feng, fails to kill her (but does manage to kill the Emberling), but does do a few more points of damage.

Mei Feng charges up, uses a string of Tiger's Claws strikes with the Tiger's Fury trigger, and kills Sonnia (but see below).  I end up conceding (although I guess Sammael could've made an attempt at killing her and playing for less of a loss).

Rob would've won the strategy (4 points), Mei Feng survived (2 points), but he didn't kill Fransisco in melee, meaning the final score was 6-0.  Quite a beating!

Thoughts:

I can't really say if this will end up being a good matchup.  Having some experience with her now, Rob says he should be taking more Rail Workers with her to exploit Express Line, and move her around more, which will probably make her a lot scarier.  On top of that, he did have some maneuvering issues that he'll be able to fix with a few more games of practice.

One big thing we DID screw up, however, is Mei Feng's trigger.  The end reads "perform a melee Strike against another target in melee range."  We played it that the target could be the same person (ie, Sonnia), which let him belt off the 5 attacks it took to kill her (she missed once).  With the trigger, she'd have had to kill Sammael as well (she certainly had the range), but maybe would've killed him quickly enough to save Sonnia.  Hard to say.  I started Mei Feng's activation with more Soulstones than her, so it's possible. 

Of course... Sammael would've been dead, Sonnia would've already activated, and I wouldn't have had any way to kill Mei Feng this turn, so it's hard to think the result would've changed at all.

If I remembered all of Sammael's rules, who knows what the result would've been as well.  Extra damage plus a higher stat value is really sweet, and definitely makes me eager to see him on the table again!

Regardless, the game was a lot of fun, and it's nice seeing Ten Thunders models on the table.  Also, Rob has been working extra hard to get his models painted, and the effort shows- his side of the board looked beautiful.  Definitely something to make me more eager to paint, when I have the time to do so.

We should have another game of Malifaux soon- hopefully I'll have more Guild stuff assembled, giving me some options in the game.  Maybe I can the next one a closer match :).

Until next time!

Hobby progress for February, 2013

(EDIT: Oops, forgot to update this as the month went along!)

This month:

Malifaux:
* One game played (using Sonnia Criid) 

Saga:
* Starter Box of Jomsvikings Filed
* Starter Box of Skraelings Filed

Warmachine/Hordes:
* One game played (eHexeris)
* Unit of Long Gunners filed
* Unit of Cygnar Mechanics filed
* A few other Cygnar solos filed
* Cyclops Shaman filed
* Necrosurgeon filed

X-Wing:
* One game played (As the Imperials)

Hobby progress for January, 2013

This month:

Dreadball: 
* All miniatures from Dreadball box are assembled
* Played a game of Dreadball, to learn the rules.

Malifaux:
* Played two games of Malifaux using my Neverborn.
* Re-based some of the Lilith crew onto Victorian bases.

Warmachine/Hordes:
* Terminus completely assembled.
* Cataphract Arcuarii completely assembled.
* Got main body of Wraith Engine assembled.
* Played two games, using my Cryx.

Hell Dorado:
* Got two of the Westerner Arquebusiers assembled. 

Gaming from January 22nd, 2013

Played a few games on the 22nd against Rob.

First game up was Malifaux.  I took my normal Lilith list.  Rob was interested in trying out the post-errata Hamelin, and therefore took the following list:

Hamelin the Plagued -- 4 Pool
Hoarcat Pride
Hoarcat Pride
Malifaux Rat
Malifaux Rat
Malifaux Rat
Nix, the Bull Terrier
Rat Catcher
The Stolen

Using the Hoarcat Prides was a bit of a surprise, but seeing as how my experience with Hamelin was short (and frankly, unpleasant), I guess I should be expecting anything.

We flipped for Strategies.  Mine was Reconnoiter (control quarters of the board), Rob's was Plant Evidence (take (1) Interact actions on terrain on my side of the board).  Overall, I felt that the Strategies were in my favor- I have been trying to spread out my forces, which I think is important for success, and I don't think coming across the board quickly is part of Hamelin's ideal plan.

Schemes were next.  Rob's schemes were Bodyguard (Hamelin), and Plague on Malifaux (basically, turn my guys into rats).  I chose Bodyguard (Lilith) and Breakthrough (have more guys in his deployment zone at the end of the game than he does).  Off we go!

Turn 1:
I win Initiative.  I have my Terror Tot, Lelu, and Lilitu run off to my left, into a set of ruins.  Lilith moves over to my right, throwing down an Illusory Forest, and the Mature Nephilim hops over to join her.  Tuco takes a potshot at Hamelin, misses, and moves to join the group on my left.

Rob's activations were spent moving his models forward, generally, although he summoned a Stolen which he moved towards Tuco.


Turn 2:
Rob won the Initiative, flipping the Red Joker, I believe.  Rob started the turn by having Hamelin summon another Stolen, then walking back towards his corner. 

I activated Tuco next, and decided that with Hamelin backing up, Nix was the next best target.  I shot at him, and did 2 damage (but see the post-game thoughts, below), before backing Tuco out of threat range.

Nix activated next, and he Herded the rats forward, and moved a little forward himself.

We both waste a few activations, jockeying for position (Hamelin's crew generally moving a little more forward, and Lilith and the Mature Nephilim swinging out more to my left), before I finally activate Lilitu, and walk her up, and throw a Lure on a Malifaux Rat.  The rat failed to resist, got pulled foward into Lilitu's melee range, and she killed it.  Since I had pulled the rat away from Nix's Aura, the rat couldn't respawn, and this was an unpleasant (albeit small at the time) turn of events for Rob.  Lilitu ended her activation throwing a Lure at Hamelin, which forced Rob to use a card to resist (although truthfully, he could have ignored it, but it never hurts to be careful).  Rob decided to plug the gap in the ruins with Malifaux Rats, hoping to prevent future Lure shenanigans.


At turn end, I was feeling pretty good.  Lilith and the Mature Nephilim were in okay position, and weren't in danger at the moment.  In the ruins, my four models were more than capable of holding off a few rats, I figured.  If I could hold on my left, I was hoping to send Lilith and the Mature into Rob's backfield, and start doing some more significant damage.

Turn 3:
I won Initiative. I start with activating Lilith and Lelu (using Companion), and the end result is that the Rat Catcher is Lured forward and killed.  Rob has the Malifaux Rats respond by sacrificing a bunch of them to summon another Rat Catcher.

Unfortunately, the Rat Catcher is close enough to Tuco that I shoot him, deal several points of damage, and put a poison counter on him, which (with one health remaining) kills him his next activation, which Rob took immediately to force me to activate another model.

I decide it's time to get up into the action, have Lilith use Brood Mother on the Mature Nephilim (giving the Mature Nephilim the next activation after Lilith), and charge Lilith into the nearest Hoarcat Pride.  Unfortunately, my flipping wasn't very good, and the cards in my hand weren't much better, and I only deal a moderate amount of damage, leaving it alive.

The Mature follows up by charging the other Hoarcat and hits, but I trigger Knock Aside, and charge into Nix instead, killing him and ending engaged with the last Malifaux Rat.  Things are starting to look a little bleak for Rob, but with a smile on his face, he makes a move to try to even it up.

First, Hamelin activates, and after several casts, finally makes Lilith Insignificant.  No matter the result of his final activations, at least Lilith won't count for my victory conditions.  He follows this up by having his Hoarcats Prides get close to me, and successively cast Devour, hoping to snatch up Lilith, and have her Sacrificed.  Several failed attempts later, Rob looks at the board state, and concedes. 

It indeed started to look bad for him- Lilith could've handled the Hoarcats decently well, and Lure plus all my melee should have been enough to bring Hamelin down, I thought.  With that said, even without Rats, Hamelin's various tricks could've still made the game a challenge, I thought.  Still, Rob conceded, and that's the game.

Thoughts:
Well, there were several things going on here, but we should start with the thing we did obviously wrong, and this is something I didn't know about Hamelin and Nix- they are spirits!  That means they take half damage from non-magical attacks.  Turns out, I don't have many options on that front, meaning Nix may have survived, and taking Hamelin down would've been a lot tougher.  It may have been enough to change the game, truthfully, and will be something to remember for next time.

Hamelin's changes are pretty huge.  Rob's initial impression was that the changes were perhaps too much, and although there may be some truth there, it's definitely a very different model on the board than the first time I played against him.  He needs to be up near the action (so that his Nihilism aura can help out), and he needs to be up there with Nix backing up his Rats' rush into combat.  Rob moved Hamelin back during the second turn, I'm assuming to protect him from what he perceived was my Mature Nephilim and Lilith getting too close, when really he needed to get up there and depend on his Stolen to keep him alive.

The game wasn't long enough to really get a feel for my play- overall I thought I played alright, although I did get a little bottled up in the Ruins- partially because I ran Tuco into them instead of leaving him out to be a pain in Rob's backside.  I need to do a better job of keeping him out and fighting, I guess.

Dreadball:
We ended the night by getting about halfway through a game of Dreadball.  Having finally gotten everyone assembled, I taught Rob the rules, and we began playing.  I took no notes, because I was trying to keep the game moving, although the basic events were that I quickly went up +6 using the Orx, but Rob fought back, and we ended the game with me up +2 with about 7 Rushes left, and Rob with the definite momentum.

After my short experience with the game, I have to say that I really do quite like it- it's very fluid, and the action doesn't have any resets, which is nice.  Getting the occasional extra action from various cards is VERY helpful (I used cards to score both of my 3 point strikes), and although the ref didn't play any part of our game, I like the fouling mechanics, and look forward to games where they actually matter.

Anyway, thanks for reading!

Hamelin Errata'd!

I admit, I'm a little behind, but still: great news!

I won't say I had enough experience facing him to think he was actually broken, but there certainly were several things I disliked about him after my first time facing him, especially while using Neverborn.  Given that even the poster described them as overdue, I don't think I'm alone here.

For the most part, these are a thing of the past.  Let's see what changed:

Indiscriminant Void is much simpler, and I believe was changed to stop some funky interactions with other models.  I'm not sure, but I don't think it'll change his play a whole lot.  Instead of him being placed and sacrificing a Stolen, the Stolen is just sacrificed, Hamelin stays put, and heals up.

Nihilism is basically an aura now, which is awesome, but hurts him a little, because now he'll have to be near the objectives in order to claim them- the rats can't do it themselves.

Bully was taken away, and replaced with Ruffian, which is a badly needed balance mechanism- now Gremlins and the like CAN target Hamelin, they just have to pass a WP -> 13 duel to do so.

Fate is Meaningless (Model ignores any modifiers to its flips during its next action) was turned into a (1) action (formerly (0)).  I feel like this probably wasn't needed, especially since Useless Toy is still a (0) action, and overall probably more useful.

Haunting Melody changed to Wp->14 Duel is helpful, going against the Combat Duel total could have really sucked.

Overall, seems like a decent set of changes, at the very least making him a 'reasonable' matchup for Gremlins, plus a lot of other nice things to keep him in check.

Nix also gets the Nihilism aura, which again, is a nice balance mechanism, and gives Hamelin a way to win scenarios without necessarily being RIGHT THERE.  Sweet Taste of Failure also only works on enemy models- a pretty nice change, since you generally aren't worried about Malifaux Rats failing duels, therefore Nix has to get close to use it.

Abandon has been removed from the Stolen.  No longer can they make a model insignificant for basically no cost to the Hamelin crew (since he can create Stolen with a (1) action).

I've not seen the Rat-Catcher in action, but he's changed to be no longer Insignificant, but allowed to be added to Hamelin's crew via Affinity, and now, instead of freely killing Rats (which would give them infinite activations!), he can make them lose Slow.  Still, a really nice ability for rats, but no longer feeling sort of ridiculous.

The Malifaux Rat, I felt, was the biggest problem with the Hamelin crew.  They've changed quite a bit.  No more -Wp combat trigger for them.  No more Instinctual.  No free positive flip modifier.  No more ability to remove Corpse and Scrap counters (why?).  Instead, if an enemy model is in contact with 3 or more Malifaux Rats, that model is -2 Df and -2 Wp.  This still has a very thematic feel (swarms of rats slowing your opponent down), but is not a permanent effect.  Also, combined with the Rat-Catcher, players will still get a lot of mileage out of the Rats and get more attacks, I'm guessing.  The biggest change, for me, is their new rule: They're Just Rats.  Other friendly models can't bring them to less than 1 WD, and can't be Summoned again if killed during it's own activation.  Black Blood now kills rats dead!  No more infinite activations!  Huzzah!  Seriously though, I feel this is a fantastic improvement.

Overall, it looks like Hamelin DOES maintain his feel and style (which is what made Rob interested in him anyway), but made him more in line with other Masters in the game.  Truthfully, seems like very good changes, and certainly for the good of the game.

Malifaux Battle Report, 1/8/13 - First minis game of 2013!

Played Rob in Malifaux last Tuesday, over at DropZone.  I had finally assembled Lelu and Lilitu, so was pretty excited to finally have my 'goal' 35 Soulstone list up and running.

We flipped for our strategy, and ended with Shared Deliver a Message- basically, a member of our crew had to take a (2) action within 2" of the opponent's master.  The earlier we did it, the better.

My list:

Lilith, Mother of Monsters -- 5 Pool
Lelu
Lilitu
Mature Nephilim
Terror Tot Nephilim
Tuco

I chose to announce Bodyguard (Lilith) and Breakthrough as my Schemes.

Rob's list (I think):

Rasputina -- 6 Pool
Essence of Power
Blessed of December
Ice Gamin
Ice Gamin
Ice Golem
Silent One

Rob's schemes were Bodyguard (Rasputina) and Sabotage, both of which he announced.

We actually had a decent amount of terrain on the table, looking like a nice outpost town.

Turn 1:

I win initiative, and we basically all walk towards the middle of the board, getting into position.  I had Tuco over on Rob's far left, hoping to get a little behind him and cause some annoyance.  Rob threw up some Ice Pillars right in the middle of the board, and I gladly had Lilith walk up and kill one of them.  We ended the turn pretty far apart... but definitely close enough that next turn was going to get ugly.



Turn 2:

Rob won Initiative, and sends an Ice Gamin forward and has him turn into a statue (making him really easy to hit, but much more difficult to damage).

I have Tuco activate from the side, Veil up, and Run and Gun back, shooting at the Ice Gamin.  After a decent flip, Rob decides to play the Red Joker from his hand to cause me to miss.  I give him one of my 'huh?' stares, which he ignores, and we move on.  For the record: it turns out I didn't explain my abilities correctly, and when I said Run and Gun let's me shoot then get a charge move, it wasn't clear that it wasn't an actual charge.  I really need to work on this, to save poor Rob his high cards sometimes ;).

The rest of the turn involves me moving pretty much centrally to the table, around the ice pillar that's left (which my Terror Tot fails to kill), and Lilith walking up and dropping an Illusory Forest in front of my forces, then using my Mature Nephilim to carry Lilith back to safety.

Rob's activations involved him moving forward as well, and throwing Ice Pillars off to my left you can see the edge of one of them in the following picture.  He then had the Blessed of December move into the cover the Ice Pillars provided.  I was a little concerned about this- but for the wrong reason.  I had this feeling that he was going to have the Blessed use his Jump, and get into position for a really early message delivery.  Turns out... not so much.



Turn 3:

Rob wins Initiative, and again sends his Ice Gamin up to statue.

I, again, have Tuco Veil and Run and Gun, and finally get a hit (my first EVER hit with Tuco), putting two damage on the dastardly Ice Gamin.  Then, Tuco runs behind cover.

Rob advances his Ice Golem up, parking him just past the far right of the Illusory Forest (from my perspective).

The Terror Tot finally manages to kill the Ice Pillar facing me.  Now, you might be thinking, "Hey Asmo, isn't it only Breakable 3?  Your Terror Tot kills is on a 4+ flip?".  You're right.  It took the Terror Tot three tries (one last turn).  That was a tough pillar of ice.

Rob's Silent One advances next to the Ice Golem, and does it's healing thing, helping the poor Ice Gamin.

I finally get in on the action, and activate Lilitu and Lelu.  Lilitu begins casting Lure on the Ice Golem, and after several casts, have moved the Ice Golem close enough forward that Lilitu can attack it, and on doing so, fails to hit it.  Lelu follows up with a vicious charge, and again, I fail to hit.  Not such good flipping this turn.

Rasputina activates, and throws Ice Pillars in front of Lilith and the Mature Nephilim, most likely to prevent both of them from being able to charge (and probably kill) the Ice Golem this turn.

I, of course, am perfectly happy sending Lilith forward to kill Ice Pillars, killing one, then move back and use Brood Mother to activate the Mature Nephilim, who charges up and kills the Silent One and an Ice Gamin.  I'm pretty happy with this, of course...

...until Rob activates his Blessed of December, who Jumps forward and Sabotages the building he had targeted (and then moving into the back of the Mature, hoping to damage it next turn).  I find myself ending Turn three down 4-2 (we're each +2 because of the Bodyguard Scheme). 



Turn 4:

I win initiative, and promptly activate my Mature Nephilim, who quickly dispatches the Blessed of December, and attempts to attack the Ice Golem with his last action, but deals almost no damage.

Rob activates his Ice Golem, and finds himself having no problems hitting, dealing quite a bit of damage to the Mature Nephilim, but not quite killing him.

I have a bit of an issue here, unfortunately, as killing the Ice Golem will cause it to explode, bringing my dear Mature Nephilim down to like 2 Wounds, meaning it'd be easy to bring down.  However, I can't afford NOT to kill it, activate Lelu, and do so, damaging quite a bit of my models.

Rasputina wastes no time taking advantage of things, and flings some spells, killing the Mature Nephilim and damaging my Lelu, which his Essence of Power quickly finishes off.

With Lelu gone, my Lilitu is in a bad spot, and I figure my best bet to give myself a shot at the endgame is to move Lilith forward, sacrifice four Soulstones for two Blood Counters, and hope to summon a Lelu, sacrificing my Terror Tot.  Lilith moves up, does so, and Lilith easily makes the flip, giving me back my Lelu.

I've put myself into a pretty good position, overall.  Rob is down to just an Ice Gamin, Rasputina, and the Essence of Power, where I still have Lilith, Lelu and Lilitu, and Tuco.  If I can get to him, it's a decent match-up.



Turn 5:

This turn was fairly unremarkable.  Rob moves his guys back, to hide behind the building, and I move forward, trying to close the distance.  Lilith also throws an Illusory Forest off to my left, just in case Rob tries to go over there and fling spells at me... again.



Turn 6:

Rob wins the initiative, moves Rasputina out from behind the building, and tries to throw spells at Lilith, but is just out of range.

I'm salivating at this point, since Lilith is FAST.  And, she has the Fast Ability, so go figure.  I walk Lilith forward, and charge in, swinging happily, and deal pretty weak damage to Rasputina, and end Lilith's activation, pretty pleased with how things are turning out.

Then Rob activates his Ice Gamin, delivers the message to my now REALLY close Lilith, and goes up 7-2.  Bastard tricked me!

*sigh.  I'm a little displeased at this turn of events, but to my credit, I think I only swore once.  I do some thinking.  I'm actually right where I want to be- up in his grill.  I still outnumber him, and should have no issues killing Rasputina, I think, if the game goes another turn.  Fine, that denies him his other Scheme, keeping him to five points.  If I keep Lilith alive (not too hard to do), and get all of my guys into the zone, I can get up to four points, which is better than being shut out.  Of course, that involves the game lasting another turn- I'm not close enough with most of my guys to get them into the deployment zone this turn.  Still... 5-4 is still a loss.  Then I remember- Oh!  I can deliver a message too!  That would tie us up, and frankly, that's the best I can do at this point.

So... everything moves forward, hoping to get in on the action early next turn.  If there is a next turn.

We flip to continue the game (needing a 10+), and thankfully we flip a 12.  Whew!  One more turn.

Turn 7:

I win initiative.  I'm stuck having Lilith activate, and using Brood Mother on Lilitu.  I can't have Lilith attack Rasputina yet, because that would make me unable to deliver the message, so Lilith herself delivers it, bringing the score up to 7-3, then I swing with my last action, and almost kill Rasputina, but thankfully Lilitu is there to help, killing Rasputina AND the Ice Gamin, removing all of the Arcanists from the board.

My guys all move into Rob's deployment zone, and we end the game, tied 5-5.

Afterthoughts:

Well, that was certainly a tough game.  Rob seems to have gotten a handle on Rasputina, and although I think I have a decent handle on Lilith, she's so one-dimensional that it's hard to really handle some of these games.  I mean, Rob knows my game plan right away- he just needs to keep me at range long enough to beat me into submission.

Of course, I still have some new options I can try with Lilith, to maybe add some surprises.  There were a couple of times I thought about Transpositioning the Mature Nephilim into a place, and using Brood Mother early to get a decent charge into Rasputina.  I don't know how viable something like that is (it might just be a way to make Rasputina spend Soulstones early to save herself), but it's something I should try.

I also could try running Nekima or the Black Blood Shaman, which could give me some fun in-game choices.

Still, I'm having a blast with Lilith as is, and Rob seems to be having a great time with Rasputina.  At this rate though, he's going to be stomping me pretty soon!

Hobby progress for week ending 12/15/12

A little done:

- Started assembly of Lelu and Lilitu for my Neverborn crew.
- Started assembly on a Watcher for my Guild crew.
- Got about halfway through assembling Gerlak Slaughterborn for my Cryx army.
- Drybrushed bone color onto my Slayer.

Really, I need to work harder on painting a tiny bit every day- I've had a rough patch, timing-wise for this, but hopefully I can get that back on course.

Malifaux battle report from 12/11/12, or 'How I manage to have things go badly, but still pull out a win'

This past Tuesday, Rob and I played two games of Malifaux over at DropZone.

Our first game was a 30 SS game.  I chose to run my Neverborn, and ran this list:

Lilith, Mother of Monsters -- 6 Pool
Malifaux Cherub [2ss]
Mature Nephilim [10ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]
Tuco [7ss]

Tuco was a new addition for me- I finished his assembly last week, and was eager to get him on the table, and see how he played.

Rob chose to run an Arcanist crew:

Rasputina -- 5 Pool
Essence of Power [2ss]
Blessed of December [8ss]
Ice Gamin [4ss]
Ice Golem [9ss]
Silent One [6ss]

I had never seen some of these models (the Silent One or the Blessed of December, in particular), so I was excited to see how they'd play.

After flipping for Strategies and deployment, we ended having Shared Turf War (basically, get your models on the opposing side of the table) with a Diagonal deployment.

I chose Bodyguard (Lilith) and Breakthrough as my Schemes, and announced Breakthrough.  Rob announced that he has chosen Reflections of December.

Turn 1:

Here's my setup.



The ruined (greenish) building was being played as a Creepy Structure, so we could go up, spend actions, and get random effects.  We're trying to add more interesting terrain to the table, but in this game, we didn't use the Creepy Structure once.

Sorry about the blurry photo, but you can see that I had my Mature Nephilim off to my right, Tuco off to my left (due to the diagonal deployment, Tuco's strange deployment rules didn't end up accomplishing me anything), and everything else sort of centrally.

My game plan was simple.  Send everything up, get it into combat, and hopefully trounce Rob.  Tuco was there to be an annoyance, and hopefully draw at least some of Rob's attention.

Rob won the initiative first turn, and really, all we did was move all of our models forward.  Lilith spent two of her Soulstones to get a Blood Counter.

Turn 2:



I win initiative, and send a Terror Tot forward, towards the middle of the table, and have him grow into a Young Nephilim.

Rob sends an Ice Gamin towards the building.  I activate Tuco, and hope to start being annoying.  I use Veil Appearance to get pushed forward a little, walk up (using Nimble), and Run and Gun, letting me shoot (at a negative), but letting me move backwards 6"- hopefully out of range of Rob's army.  I try to shoot at his Silent One, which was the closest target, and after some cheating, manage to get a hit high enough to cause no modifier to damage.  With a card in my hand to guarantee Severe damage, I get excited about spreading some damage out... and then flip a Black Joker off the top of my deck.  No damage, no possibility of cheating the damage flip, and a very (VERY) disappointing development).

Rob, however, has no issue dealing damage, and sends Rasputina forward, to give her a view into the gap between the buildings.  She starts dropping spells, and when the dust (ice?) settles, she's managed to kill both of my Terror Tots, as well as my newly grown Young Nephilim.  As an aside- Rob misread his Scheme, and didn't use Ice Mirror to get the kills, which was a bit of a downside for him, but given the new board state, I figured he'd get over it.  His Essence of Power followed up on Rasputina by throwing some Ice Pillars in front of Rasputina to defend her.

Following up on Rob's very damaging activation, I have my Mature Nephilim charge his Blessed of December, and after both of us throwing a LOT of cards down for cheating, I manage to put four damage on it. 

The only other activation of note for this turn was that Lilith put an Illusory Forest into play, in between Rob's Ice Golem and his Blessed of December/my Mature Nephilim.  The Ice Golem isn't exactly fast, and although the Mature Nephilim can handle each of his two models individually, he certainly can't tackle both at once.

Turn 3:



I apologize for how blurry that picture is.  Lilith is over on the right, protected by the building.  That red ring on the top of the picture is my Illusory Forest.  Rasputina, the Silent One, and the Essence of Power are over on the left.

I win initiative, but Rob spends a Soulstone a wins the reflip.  Continuing with his steamrolling of me, he activates Rasputina and his Totem, sends them forward, and kills my Cherub (unfortunate because part of my plan to get back in this game was to Transposition Lilith into combat with Rasputina).   Casting some Ice Pillars and December's Touch on Rasputina let her sit pretty safely.

Tuco activates, and I do the same things as before.  Veil Appearance, walk up, Run and Gun at the Silent One, and Rob drops a 13 on the table to save her.

Rob responds by having his Blessed of December start tearing into the Mature Nephilim, and after triggering an additional attack plus the additional attack from Melee Expert, manages to put four damage onto it.

I have my Mature Nephilim kill the Blessed, and walk away, attempting to reposition him towards the middle, and try to salvage that part of the game.

Rob's Ice Gamin moves towards the rounded building, and I have Lilith go up and kill it (I can attack through walls, since I can draw LoS through them with Lilith's Master of Malifaux ability).

Rob starts moving his Ice Golem back deeper into his deployment zone, hoping to stop my Breakthrough Scheme. 

Finally, Rob's Silent One walks over, and starts dumping damage on Tuco, bringing him down to 2 remaining Wounds, I believe.

At this point, this are looking pretty bleak.  I'm down to three models (Mature, Nephilim, Tuco), and I've only killed one of Rob's.  I can't seem to get things placed correctly to seriously threaten his group of models, and most of my guys already are wounded.  With that said- it's certainly not over yet.  Lilith is not easy to kill, especially with a stack of Soulstones, and my Bodyguard Scheme means I will get some victory points.  If I can deny Rob from scoring too many, I can still pull this off.

Turn 4:



Rob wins initiative, and activates his Silent One.  The Silent One is already in range, and has no issue killing Tuco (even with his Hard to Kill).  Yay for spending the stones on a model that did no damage all game.  *sigh.

I move Lilith back behind the Creepy Structure.  I figure if Rob is going to make a play for my side of the board, I can have her pop out and try to wreck some havoc.

Rob responds by moving most of his models towards my Mature Nephilim, who was threatening his side of the board, and who I end up moving FURTHER into his side of the board, hoping to win the Turf War Strategy.

Turn 5:

I win Initiative. My Mature goes into Defensive Stance, and moves further into Rob's zone.  Of course, Defensive Stance is worthless against all of Rob's spells, but I did have some concerns about him having his Ice Golem taking shots at me.

Rob again moves most of his guys kind of centrally, somewhat towards the Mature, somewhat towards my side of the board, and attempts a long range spell, but is slightly out of range of the Mature.

I back Lilith further up, and cast Illusory Forest closer to me, blocking any Line of Sight onto me.

Turn 6:

I win Initiative, and realize that with Fast, I have enough activations and speed to get onto Rob's side of the board, and that there isn't much over there to threaten me.  First though, I decide to try to save the Mature Nephilim, in case the game goes longer, and have him back up, attempting to hide him behind a forest.

Rob starts moving his crew to my side of the board, but his guys are not very fast, and they do not get very far.

And Lilith books it, and gets pretty far.  I'm not sure it's enough... but if the game goes another turn, I'll definitely have plenty of distance (of course, Rob might as well...)

We flip to continue the game... and flip a 10, adding another turn!

Turn 7:

Rob wins Initiative.  Not a very exciting turn- I move Lilith into his zone, Rob attempts to move his crew into mine.  We flip to end the game, and this time it's a low number, ending it.

Scoring:

We start by checking out the Strategy.  Turf War gives a player two points if they have models completely within his opponent's side of the board.  We measure, and I easily do for 2 VP.  Rob however, wasn't able to get over quickly enough, and doesn't score here.  I also get an additional VP for having more models in the opposing deployment zone than my opponent (I had one to his zero).  However, Rob has more models on my half of the board than I do on his, and scores a VP.  So far, 3 VP for me, and 1 for him.

On to Schemes.  Rob failed to achieve his Scheme (although, only because he misread what he had to do.  He easily could've accomplished it on the turn he dropped all my Terror Tots), whereas with Lilith alive, I achieved my Bodyguard Scheme, giving me 1 VP.

Final score: 4 VP - 1 VP.  Neverborn win!

Thoughts:

Given that Lilith is my primary crew, and Rasputina is Rob's primary one, I imagine this is a matchup I'll see a lot of.  It seems fairly well balanced- I have a lot more speed and more close combat advantage, but Rasputina certainly has me beat at range.

When Lelu and Lilitu are assembled, I'll have fewer fragile models on the table, which may help me survive some of that initial magical damage, but as Rob gets more experience with his guys, who knows how that will balance out.  I'll have to practice more with my movement tricks to get guys into combat, against someone who has the tools to keep his crew well defended, and a playstyle that focuses on it.  It will be interesting!

Second game (brief):

We had a little bit of time after our first game, and tried to fit in a second game.  I won't write a full report for it, however.  I was trying out Sonnia Criid's box against a smaller version of Rob's Rasputina crew.

We only ended up going four turns, and Rob had managed to kill all of my Witchling Stalkers for relatively light damage in return, so it wasn't look good at game end.  I just couldn't get flips to go in my favor (Sammael at one point Rapid Fired into Rob's Blessed of December, in combat with one of my Witchling Stalkers- a favorable shot, since the Blessed draws twice as many cards as the Witchling when we determine who I hit... and hit the Witchling all three times, killing it).




Mercifully, I suppose, we didn't play a full game.  This game, Rob definitely had his guys moving up the table quicker (despite us being deployed further back- we had Corner deployment this time), and I had no idea how to respond.  However, I'm eager to get Sonnia back on the table, so this will be something I'm sure we'll see a rematch of at some point.

Thanks for reading everyone!

Hobby progress for week ending 2/8/2012

This week, I did a bunch of random assembly:

- Assembled Tuco for my Neverborn crew.
- Assembled my Sonnia Criid crew (Criid, Sammael, and three Witchling Stalkers).
- Assembled a flamethrower and a sniper for my German Bolt Action army.  They aren't field-able yet (they need additional team members), but it was nice to put together a few of the minis.

No painting this week, unfortunately, but next week I'll get back to doing small amounts of painting every night.

Lilith list for 35 ss

So, I've been trying to think what I can do with my Lilith army to make it more 'generally' good.  Out of the box, in my few games of experience, she's certainly been solid, and fun to play, but I find that not only is she fairly one-dimensional (get stuff into combat, make Nephilim bigger), she also has some pretty serious holes in her attack.  So, I decided to see what sort of things I could take with her at 35 Soulstones, which seems to be a fairly normal size for games.

Using the handy Malifaux crew creator, I came up with this:

Neverborn Crew - 35 - Scrap

Lilith, Mother of Monsters -- 5 Pool

Lelu [7ss]
Lilitu [7ss]
Mature Nephilim [10ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]
Tuco [7ss]

I'll have to play this a few times, of course, to see how I like it, but I think this will definitely be a step up.  Some thoughts on my decisions:

Tuco seems to be a necessity here.  I have practically no effective ranged threat using Lilith otherwise, and against some Masters *coughHamelincough* I really feel like I'll have a difficult time dealing any sort of damage without SOMETHING ranged.  Tuco has a decent ranged shot, and a few movement shenanigans and special rules to help keep him safe and effective.

I don't know how effective Lelu/Lilitu are, but I feel like having them in my list for a few games would add some variety.  Lilitu's Lure spell will give me some additional tricks I can pull on my opponent's models, and the two of them can (hopefully) be somewhat durable with Regeneration and additional healing (from Drink Blood, I guess).  At 14 total Soulstones, they'll have more table presence than a Mature Nephilim and a Terror Tot, and can give me some more options.

I've only (so far) taken Lilith with the Mature and Terror Tot Nephilim, and I wanted to have one of each in my list.  The Mature Nephilim is fantastic- he's fun, he's fast, he hits hard.  What's not to like?  The Terror Tot is around primarily so that I have something to spend Blood Tokens on (either for Growth, or for one of the Summon Lelu/Lilitu spells if necessary).  Using it as a target for Lilith's Transposition spell is a useful option as well.

So, with that said, what's not in the list that I could've taken?

The Black Blood Shaman has a lot of tools that could be really handy, but I don't know that I could get as much mileage out of him as I'd like, both through limited Blood Counters, and limits to my play ability.  Maybe eventually I'll pick one up and switch him in.

I really really wanted to take a Cherub in the list, but couldn't afford it.  This hurts most because it takes away one of my primary ways to get Lilith around out of activation, but maybe I can utilize Lilitu's Lure to accomplish the same goal. 

Nekima is really the only other model that would fit, but man, she's so expensive (13 Soulstones).  She does have a bunch of helpful abilities, but she doesn't really add all that much to my crew that I don't already have in some form. 

As for Schemes, I think I have a lot of options running this list.  Breakthrough is a good choice, since most likely I'm going to be advancing on my opponent.  Bodyguard isn't a bad choice as well, since Lilith's defensive stats are pretty solid.  Kidnap and Reclaim Malifaux work great as well, the latter for the same reason as Breakthrough.  I have some great choices here, and I'm sure, combined with whatever the Strategy ends up being, I'll be able to keep my opponent on his toes.

So what do you think?  Anyone with experience running Lilith?  Suggestions?

Hobby progress for week ending 12/1/2012

So this week, I've been busy during the evenings, helping my girlfriend with her college coursework, but I did manage to get a little done.

First, I am read up on all the Malifaux books, which is great.  The overall fiction in the book is really cool, and knowing about the background certainly makes the game more enjoyable.

On the painting front, I've put most of the base layer of Vallejo Chainmail Silver on my Slayer.  I really want to do more painting, but it's difficult with a minimum of time.

For assembly- I've finished all of the filing for my Wraith Engine conversion, meaning that next week, I start assembly!  I glued Terminus' sword into his model, so now I'm just left with a few spikes left until he's completed.  I also filed down Sonna Criid, but didn't quite glue her yet (or start on the rest of her crew).

Malifaux game, 11/27/12

This will be a short battle report, haha.

Rob and I played a game of Malifaux yesterday, over at DropZone games.  We chose to play a 21 Soulstone game, and I took my Lilith crew as well as a Cherub.  Rob has been real excited to play Hamelin, and even painted his army before putting them on the table (very nicely done, I might add!).  We flipped and got Shared Claim Jump as our Strategy, and I chose Breakthrough and Holdout for my schemes (this is our first time using schemes, I was going for simple ones).

So, we setup, and started to play.



Our first turn was pretty boring- we just moved everything towards the middle.  Rob had Hamelin sacrifice a rat to draw cards, and summon a Stolen.




Eager to come to grips with my opponent, I have my Mature Nephilim start the second turn by charging one of Rob's rats, killing it and a stolen.  Big mistake though.  The rat respawns, and in return, Hamelin makes my Mature Nephilim charge a Terror Tot, killing it, THEN proceeds to force the Nephilim to attack Lilith, although he missed.

At this point, I've killed a Stolen, and lost a Terror Tot.  Rob can keep bringing Stolen back, if need be, however, so it's not a big loss for him.  I decide to be aggressive, and have Lilith charge in, and manage to kill Nix (his doggie). 

In return, Rob's rats begin swarming Lilith.  And here's where it gets a little.. strange, I guess.  They take a point of damage to reposition themselves around her (they can't move then attack, because they are Slow), attack her, and on a hit, damage her, give her a Blight Token, and cause her Black Blood to trigger... killing all the rats, respawning them, and letting them attack her again during a later activation (they can't receive Slow a second time, after all).  By the end of the turn, they had easily killed Lilith (although it took them another respawn, I believe).

At this point, I looked at the board- I was outnumbered, I had no way to stop the rats from easily killing the Mature Nephilim next turn, and couldn't score enough VP from my schemes to win, so I conceded.

I'm... at a bit of a loss for what to do against Hamelin.  It doesn't feel like an even matchup, but I feel like I probably do have options to play against him to at least make the game... well, a game.  First, I need to stop being so aggressive.  Charging in like I did was extremely stupid.  Second, I need to take the advice I've been giving Rob every time he talks about the trying to beat Lilith with Rasputina- I probably need to spread out a lot more.  Hamelin needs all of his things within 6" of him.  If I spread out, I may be able to make it difficult.

Also, I need to add some versatility to my crew.  I need some ranged threat, and I'm guessing for now, that's going to be Tuco.  If I can get some damage on Hamelin with shooting, I might be able to make it a closer game, as well.

So, there's certainly options, but yeah, it felt ridiculous playing the game, once the rats started doing their thing.  Of course, I'm not alone in the concerns about the matchup. And there are a lot of threads about Hamelin himself, so one hopes that maybe a small tweak will be made (well, at least I hope so :) ).  But still, I'll give it another try, and try a bit more cautious approach before I get too worried about it.  Maybe hope for a different Strategy (something where the objectives are spread out?).

After this game, it should be noted, Rob and I taught BK how to play, and he took my Lilith crew against Rob's Rasputina crew, and pulled off a win.  BK seemed to enjoy the game, and hopefully will have his upcoming crew (Jakob Lynch) ready to go soon!

Malifaux battle report, 11/20/2012

So, Minute purchased a Malifaux army, and wanted to learn the rules, so this past Tuesday, we played a small intro game at DropZone games.  I again used my Lilith starter box, and he used the Som'er Teeth Jones crew box.

After briefly going over the rules, we set up for a game.  Flipping for our Strategies, I ended up having Claim Jump (end more models near a certain point than Minute), while Minute had Treasure Hunt (grab an objective in the middle of the board, and walk it back).  We had diagonal deployment zones.

On the first turn, we both basically advanced the fullest towards the middle of the table.  I also had Lilith cast Illusory Forest in the middle of the table, near the Treasure counter.  I figured that the easiest way for me to win was to deal a ton of damage to him in the middle, then swing over on turns 5 and 6 to surround the Claim Jump marker.



In that photo, the black mini in the middle was Minute's Treasure marker, and the mini on the left was my Claim Jump marker.  My Illusory Forest in the middle of the template.

To start the second turn, I send a Terror Tot with Defensive Stance forward, hoping to get into a good position without taking too much shooting damage.  Minute sends a Bayou Gremlin over to my left, and I happily send my Mature Nephilim into him, easily killing him.  Minute responds by having his Gremlins open fire- at the beginning, hitting his own guys more than the Mature Nephilim, but a Bayou Gremlin using Y'all Watch This and getting his Dumb Luck tripper puts enough damage into the Mature Nephilim that the random small shots end up bringing me down.    On top of that, Minute summons another Gremlin.  He finishes his turn by sending his Warpig forward, hoping for some scary Stampeding.



This is a picture of the middle of the board.  Warpig in combat with me, surrounded by the remainder of my crew.



And this is a picture of the left side of the board.  You'll notice- no Mature Nephilim.  Not good.

Turn 3 starts with Minute getting initiative, and Stampeding.  However, great cards in my hand combined with the Terror Tot's 6 defense mean that the Warpig ends up causing no damage, and in return, I have Lilith charge over and kill it, giving me a Blood Counter.  I spend the rest of the turn failing to Grow my Terror Tots into Young Nephilim, and Minute repositions near the wall near him, preparing to put some fire on my crew.

On Turn 4, I look at my hand- Two 13s, a 12, two 11s, and a Red Joker.  I shake my head, show Minute, and he concedes.  Most likely, I'm going to get my crew into him, and he has already expressed concerns for how to deal with Lilith here (8 defense is pretty rough for him).  Combined with his fairly mediocre hand (and Som'er reducing his hand size by one card), it probably wasn't going to be much of a game.

Once again, I really enjoyed playing this.  I find myself really enjoying the card mechanic (it really helps when I'm fairly consistently drawing good cards, and the activation system creates a lot of fun choices.

Malifaux is going to be a great time, especially when I add a few more models (ie, when me and my opponents all get up to maybe 25 soulstones or so, just so I can think some about army composition).  I do enjoy the miniatures overall, so there's certainly some extra incentive to get into painting so I can get working on them as well.

Hobby progress for week ending 11/17/2012

This week I:

- Assembled a Neverborn Cherub for my Lilith Crew.

- Attached the second wing to Terminus, leaving me only with his sword and a few spikes to assemble before he's completed.

- Assembled a Cryx Stalker.

- Continued work on Wraith Engine conversion, cleaning two more of the resin pieces.  I still have a lot of work to do, but might begin assembly of part of it this upcoming week.

- Re-primed my Slayer, with the goal to start putting paint on it, and determine my Cryx color scheme.  Something green based, most likely.

First Games of Malifaux!

Well, Rob and I finally got the Malifuax minis out, and threw down for some games last night, over at DropZone Games in Glen Burnie.

I was running my Lilith crew, which was the only one I had assembled.  She basically consists of herself, 3 Terror Tot Nephilim, and a Mature Nephilim starting on the table.  Lilith's crew seems to be pretty straight forward.  Advance, get into combat (where I'm harder to shoot AND Black Blood lets me gradually wear down my enemies), kill things, move on.  Lilith, particularly, is pretty nasty in combat, with her 3/4/6 DMG line on her sword, and a (+) flip using it.

Game 1:

For the first game, Rob tried out Rasputina's crew box against me.  Rasputina runs with a bunch of Ice-based Constructs that cause all sorts of annoying things to happen.  For instance, when one of my models kill one of his ice dudes, my model's activation ends.  It makes it tough to use certain abilities.  Also, Rasputina has this annoying ability to freeze terrain pieces, which locks people in place.  Ugh.

Anyway, we flipped for our strategies (our scenario).  I ended up flipping the one for recovering a treasure in the middle of the table, Rob flipped the one for destroying evidence.  For him to get VPs, he had to get to my side of the board, and interact with objectives.  For me to get VP, I had to get a token in the middle of the board, and have it on a model when the game ended.  As this was our first game, we skipped out on Schemes.

 Then we went at it.  Right away we both basically moved our guys to the middle as quickly as possible.



Rasputina started the second turn freezing that large terrain piece in the center, locking Lilith in place for the turn (d'oh), but I got some major revenge later in the turn when after moving an Ice Gamin up, I proceeded to kill it with my Mature Nephilim.


Next turn, I win initiative, and eagerly move Lilith off the terrain piece and into combat with the Ice Golem, dealing about 4 damage to it.  I then use my Brood Mother action to immediately activate the Mature Nephilim, charging him in and dropping another 3 damage on the Golem (normally, we each activate a model at a time, alternating players, but some abilities give you the ability to activate more than one thing at a time).  Rasputina decides to exact some vengeance, and starts dropping spells into the combat, eventually killing the Ice Golem semi-accidentally (Rob certainly wasn't unhappy doing this, as a dying Ice Golem deals damage to models close to him).  With the Ice Golem dead, she threw another spell at Lilith, dealing a total of 5 damage to her on the turn.



Next turn, Lilith and the Mature Nephilim kill Rasputina, and the following turn, I grab the treasure counter on the middle of the board edge, leaving me the winner of the game 2VP to 0VP.

Game 2:

Rob decided to try his other assembled crew, Sonna Criid,  for the second game.  Rob's strategy ended up being something about controlling board quarters (really difficult to do when you only have 5 models), and mine involved being close to a counter at game end.

We set up, and again, went at it, running things in at one another on the first turn.



That's right, we basically lined up on opposite sides of the street.  We're super tactical players.

I started turn 2 by getting things into action, my Nephilim taking down two Witchling Stalkers, letting me grow 2 Terror Tots into Young Nephilim (making them stronger).  However, I actually took a beating as well, as Sonna Criid unloaded into me, killing the Mature Nephilim and a Terror Tot.




On Turn 3, the Young Nephilim takes down Sammael, and Rob deals a decent amount of damage to everything I have on the board.  Lilith charges into Sonna, but fails to kill her.  At the beginning of the next turn, Rob kills Lilith, but leaves Sonnia too close to a badly wounded Witchling Stalker, allowing me to kill her by killing the Witchling (who explodes when he dies).  Having removed all of Rob's models, nothing stops me from getting the 4 VP from having models close to the counter you see in the pictures.

So yeah, two games in, and I personally had a blast.  There's a lot of interesting interactions in this game, but it's going to take a LOT of practice to get the hang of things here.  We'll need another model or two apiece, just to give our crews some versatility, but we'll get there, I have no doubt.  I love the use of cards instead of dice, and I love how hand management influences the games in so many ways.  Definitely looking forward to playing this again!

Hobby progress for week ending 10/27/2012

This week, I assembled two Young Nephilim for my Neverborn crew.  Now, thankfully, I have something for my Terror Tot Nephilim to look forward to, should I manage to get some blood counters in game.  With luck, maybe I can get a game in this next week.

Also, I read the rules to Firestorm Armada, and re-read the rules to Malifaux.  I don't know if I consider that 'hobby progress', but it's something that will enable me to more thoroughly enjoy games, and it's something I managed to do this week :).