Argentbadger

Good work all round, but the truly impressive thing is taking the weird cloud thing for Hamelin and making it look good. I also like the way you've used the thematic colours on the Crossroads Seven.

I really like your painting style there, especially the way the block highlighting shows off Sensei Yu's physique. The real treat is the marvellous tattoo work you've done on him though; truly wonderful.

I've booked travel for Joe Taylor, Gareth Henry and myself. Once the ticket thing starts working I'll deal with that too.

Math Mathonwy - Thanks! In game 1, I think that I left Firing Squad Injustice on Misaki, so most of the damage was probably done in the course of stabbing Jack Daw with her bisento. Of the Viks games, I think that only Mark (game 2) had no idea what was coming. Conor (game 3) had a plan for dealing with the Viks, but his mind was too frazzled to implement it properly. Josh (game 5) was too cautious of my threat range and ended up leaving me with a target but being unable to respond to anything other than Vik of Blood (though she'd already done the damage to all his fighty pieces by then). Mutter - Thank you; I'm glad you enjoy them. Treemonkey - Thanks very much. I think that 'submarining' is quite a well-known joke in the UK tournament scene, but it's always used by everyone who loses their game in round 1, regardless of how well they expect to do overall.

Nice report, especially for a first ever go. It was clear and easy to follow the action. The only thing I would ask would be for a bit more discussion of why you chose those schemes. In particular, your friend selecting Take Prisoner on Ironsides, then cutting her down anyway seems like an interesting choice.

This is the Malifaux Outcast faction effigy, the Hodgepodge Effigy. Like the Brutal Effigy, which which it shares a statline, the Hodgepodge Effigy is a highly effective scheme runner which is far more annoying to kill than its low cost would suggest. It does have a fairly rubbish melee weapon in case it is ever required to shank anyone but I generally don't find it making attacks. The two selling features of the Effigy (beyond an ability to survive and drop scheme markers cheaply) are creating cloud cover and allowing Masters to gain soulstones. Using the Mist action to put some soft cover can be important in some match-ups if there are critical open areas that you want to sit in and not be shot so much. The Hodgepodge can also put a condition on a master to allow them to discard a card and gain a soulstone if they kill anything. I've found this most useful with Leveticus in combination with the Tally Sheet upgrade so far as he often kills a couple of cheap minions in a turn. It should be really good with the Viktorias but I find that I use Viktoria of Blood to do the fighting far more than Viktoria of Ashes; it also telegraphs the intention if you need to use the chain activation as that stops you chain activating both Viktorias instead. The photos are even worse than usual today. I liked assembling this little chap but found him quite dull to paint as there just isn't that much detail to pick out. I deliberately kept him in muted colours as befits his supporting role, with the exception of the bright pink neckerchief. Next on the painting table: Abominations.

Sweet painting considering your lack of experience. The Death Marshall's coat could benefit from a second wash or a little highlighting on the raised areas to make it a bit less 'flat' looking (unless this is a photography effect). The basing is nice too.

Game 5: Outcasts (me) vs Resurrectionists (Josh) Strategy: Extraction, close deployment Schemes Pool: Convict Labour, A Quick Murder, Covert Breakthrough, Hunting Party, Show of Force Outcasts: A Quick Murder (Valedictorian), Hunting Party Resurrectionists: A Quick Murder (Taelor), Covert Breakthrough Crews Outcasts: Viktoria of Ashes (Sisters in Spirit, Sisters in Fury, Synchronised Slaying), Viktoria of Blood (Oathkeeper, Mark of Shezuul), Freikorps Trapper, Johan, Malifaux Child, Rusty Alyce (Oathkeeper), Taelor (Oathkeeper) Resurrectionists: Dr Douglas McMourning (Decaying Aura, Plastic Surgery, Moonlighting), Zombie Chihuahua, Valedictorian, Sebastian, Flesh Construct, 2 Rotten Belles, 2 Canine Remains Close deployment in a game where the other crew can't afford to hang back has Viktoria written all over it, especially with that scheme pool saying 'come into the middle and be blended'. I put Oathkeeper on both Alyce and Taelor figuring that I could possibly use them to deny Show of Force if I hadn't burned the upgrade by then. Taelor is a good bet against Resurrectionists as there is always the threat of Welcome to Malifaux spoiling their day. The board was ridiculously open but I felt that I'd be better served with a 'take and hold' approach to the centre rather than using Trappers to force the other crew into my arms. Nevertheless, I picked up one Trapper to act as spot removal of anything awkward that was left on a few wounds. I set up first and put everything right at the front (except the Child, who was hiding to avoid giving up Hunting Party if picked). Josh took the most cautious possible approach, lining up his crew almost on his own board edge. Turn 1: The Trapper has line of sight and range to the Chihuahua and blows it off the table. The Belles respond by Luring him forward. The Canine Remains come in and poison the poor chap too. Viktoria of Ashes moves forward, puts up Sisters in Fury (the Child had previously failed to cast it) and places Viktoria of Blood in a threatening position. It works well as an area denial tool as Josh is careful to measure her threat range whenever he moves anything. Unfortunately this distract him from the rest of my crew. Sebastian moves into the open so Alyce drops Oathkeeper, walk up and Rapid Fires him, burning some good cards and soulstones out of Josh's hand. In the end, Viktoria of Blood just drops a scheme marker to fake starting Convict Labour. Playing those good cards to keep Sebastian alive costs McMourning as he is unable to connect with an Expunge on the Trapper. Turn 2: Sebastian is clearly sick of being shot so he puts up Undercover and moves to get more of the Resurrectionist crew under it. I think that Josh had forgotten about the changed threat range on the Viks slingshot now that I could activate them both again; Viktoria of Ashes casts Sisters in Fury, walks over and places her sister in contact. Viktoria of Blood chain activates, drops Oathkeeper and walks to line up a charge on McMourning. She blends McMourning himself, Sebastian and an incidental Canine Remains (scoring me for Hunting Party in the process). The Flesh Construct finishes the Trapper and Alyce puts down the other Canine Remains. Johan hurts the Flesh Construct and the Belles Slow Viktoria of Blood and Taelor. The Valedictorian comes forward but Taelor can't get to her. We both score for the strategy; I move the Informant marker toward my board edge. Turn 3: Taelor puts some big dents in the Valedictorian; the Flesh Construct hits her back. The Malifaux Child fails again to cast Sisters in Fury though at least this time it does draw the Black Joker out. The Valedictorian Flurries to take Taelor down to a single wound with poison on her. Viktoria of Ashes puts Sisters in Fury up and finishes the Flesh Construct. She companions to Viktoria of Blood who walks over and one-shots a Belle (another point for Hunting Party). Johan hits the last Belle and Alyce Rapid Fires to finish the Valedictorian and score my points for A Quick Murder. Taelor soulstones away the poison damage. I score for Extraction. Turn 4: Viktoria of Ashes finishes the last Belle. Outcasts win 10 - 1 (full score for me; 1 for Extraction for Josh). Josh was a very nice opponent, always very clean and clear about what he was doing. I think that he was too cautious in his approach (or didn't out activate me by enough) to get a win in the game; his deployment alone gave me a massive positional advantage that he would always have to work to overcome as the game went on. As it turned out, he made a mistake in his estimation of Viktoria of Blood's threat range in turn 2 that allowed me to get such a big attrition advantage that the game was pretty much over by the time she was finished. From my side, of course, everything went swimmingly and I was quite happy with my positioning. When the final scores are in, I have successfully submarined my way into second place and top Outcast. I had a wonderful time playing the games and socialising with some very lovely people during, between and after the gaming. Thanks to Gareth, Mark, Conor, Callum and Josh for five terrific games of Malifaux and thanks again to Kai and his team for their hard work to make the event the huge success that it has been. As a small addendum to the weekend, I accidentally packed Mark Elwood's winners trophies in my bag when leaving, so I also had an unexpected bonus night out to go into Edinburgh to find him and return them.

Game 4: Outcasts (me) vs Gremlins (Callum) Strategy: Headhunter, standard deployment Schemes Pool: Convict Labour, Exhaust Their Forces, Inspection, Neutralize the Leader, Take Prisoner Outcasts: Convict Labour, Inspection Gremlins: Convict Labour, Neutralize the Leader Crews Outcasts: Jack Daw (Writhing Torment, Twist and Turn, Firing Squad Injustice, Guillotine Injustice, Drowning Injustice), Freikorps Librarian, 2 Guilty, Johan, Rusty Alyce (Desolate Soul), Hodgepodge Effigy, Void Wretch Gremlins: Ophelia LaCroix (Jug Rocket), War Pig, Lenny (Hide in the Mud), Rami LaCroix, Gracie, Francois LaCroix (Hide in the Mud) Headhunter is definitely a Jack Daw kind of game as I can push my own pieces around if I'm careful with deployment. Seeing Inspection in the pool I thought it would be worth taking a couple of really cheap minions (the Effigy and the Void Wretch here) and detail them just to sit and score for that scheme while also dropping two of the needed markers for Convict Labour. Guilty can be a bit of pain to deal with for Gremlins with decent defense and not much to challenge their terrible willpower; Hard To Kill is often relevant too. Seeing Callum's crew I though he'd probably push right up the centre in one big ball of death around Lenny, so I was pretty surprised when he set up the War Pig and Gracie somewhat to my right and the rest on the far left. Turn 1: Rami starts us off by shooting the Librarian for weak damage. The Guilty make Alyce Tormented but fail to do the same to the Librarian. Lenny walks forward (I was really expecting him to Toss Ophelia and Francois) and Ophelia walks up next to him, Jug Rockets Francois forward and shoots a Guilty. Francois chain activates and kills the Void Wretch. So much for that plan. Alyce is moved forward by Jack, guns down Lenny (but critically, we forgot about Hide In the Mud) and summons an Abomination. I considered whether that was worth it or not as it would leave a pretty easy head marker right next to Ophelia, but I figured it was probably worth it to cost her AP. Turn 2: The Librarian shouts her Ancient Words at Francois. Ophelia kills the Abomination and shoots Alyce. She companions Francois who picks up Lenny's head and shoots again at Alyce. She's had enough of this, killing Francois and summoning another Abomination. The Guilty start to drop scheme markers for Convict Labour. The War Pig charges into the Effigy which survives and escapes to get in place for Inspection. Rami knocks the wounded Guilty down to its Hard To Kill wound. Jack Twists and Turns to make a Guilty pick up a head and puts down a scheme marker. Gracie moves further back from my crew. We both score for Headhunter and I score for both of my schemes. Turn 3: Jack Daw charges and hurts Ophelia badly, giving her Firing Squad Injustice to keep her honest. Callum then notices a weird (but seemingly legitimate) rules interaction as Ophelia uses Plink! to get rid of it; she also shoots a good number of wound out of Jack Daw (scoring a point for Neutralise The Leader). I throw stuff at Ophelia until eventually a Guilty drags her down; the Librarian picks up her head. Johan charges Gracie, achieves almost nothing and is eaten in return. The War Pig continues to bounce off the Effigy which tries to stay safe. Alyce puts some bullets into Gracie. I score for the strategy, Inspection and Convict Labour. Turn 4: Jack Saw uses the Ghost Of Malifaux trigger to get up to Rami, killing him with a couple of swings. Gracie picks up Johan's head and my Abomination picks up Francois'. The War Pig drops a scheme marker for a belated attempt at Convict Labour. Alyce kills Gracie, summoning another Abomination simply because I can. I score for the strategy and get the last points for my schemes. Turn 5: The War Pig fails to kill the Effigy. One of the Guilty picks up one of the many heads lying around the place. Outcasts win 10 - 3 (full score for me; 2 for Headhunter and 1 for Neutralise The Leader for Callum). Callum was really fun chap to play with, always with a smile on his face and a witty comment. He even brought a prop: a tube of lube; apparently my reputation precedes me. Obviously, forgetting about Hide In The Mud on Lenny was important, but I think I had the advantage. Callum seemed overcautious with Gracie; considering that I didn't have any good way to get round armour he could possibly have benefited from ramming her into my crew and taking advantage of the confusion. I felt that the Gremlin crew was a bit too elite as there was nothing that wanted to spend its AP picking up heads dropped by the LaCroix.

Game 3: Outcasts (me) vs Ten Thunders (Conor) Strategy: Reckoning, flank deployment Schemes Pool: Convict Labour, Exhaust Their Forces, Leave Your Mark, Occupy Their Turf, Search the Ruins Outcasts: Convict Labour, Search the Ruins Ten Thunders: Leave Your Mark, Occupy Their Turf Crews Outcasts: Viktoria of Ashes (Sisters in Spirit, Sisters in Fury, Synchronised Slaying), Viktoria of Blood (Oathkeeper, Mark of Shezuul), Freikorps Librarian, 2 Freikorps Trappers, Johan, Malifaux Child, Rusty Alyce (Oathkeeper) Ten Thunders: Lucas McCabe (Glowing Sabre, Badge of Speed, Promises), Kamaitachi, 3 Torakage, Yamaziko (Smoke Bombs, Smoke and Shadows), Lone Swordsman (Recalled Training) I was very close to taking Jack Daw again here and playing a very defensive game but I learned from game 1 and went instead for a full on offensive approach with the Viktorias again. The terrain has some sparse areas so I put a pair of Trappers and Alyce in my list to abuse that; I only hoped not to face Shen Long and a pair of Katanaka Snipers. On seeing Conor's list I assumed that he was planning to buy the Torakage and them gum me up with them while forcing me to deal with the Lone Swordsman cutting all my people to bits. Convict Labour and Search The Ruins felt like good choices here as I could score them without having to engage. Therefore if Conor played a stand-off kind of game then at least I could get on with laying scheme markers all over the place. Additionally, if I place the markers well and score Convict Labour in turns 2 to 4, then the same ones can also do for Search the Ruins in turn 5. Turn 1: The Torakage disappear in clouds of smoke, one of them taking a Trapper bullet to the face before this; the other Trapper misses a focused shot at Yamaziko. McCabe Black Flashes the Kamaitachi then uses a soulstone to give both the Badge and Sabre to the Lone Swordsman. He then saunters out into some cover on the left. For reasons I am still not clear on, the Kamaitachi then pushes him past a tent on the left to engage (but at more than 2") the Trapper while also not being close enough to count the cover. Alyce, unable to believe her luck, Rapid Fires into him, drawing more soulstones, most of Conor's good cards and still leaving him on a single wound. The Lone Swordsman Nimbles up and, to my astonishment, kills McCabe to dismount him (hilariously, he Black Jokered the first damage flip and had to try again). Viktoria of Blood, fully charged with Sisters in Fury, is launched into the Lone Swordsman, dropping him easily and polishing off McCabe and the last of the Ten Thunders soulstones via whirlwind. The Torakage pop out of thin air near to Viktoria of Blood. Turn 2: I win initiative. Viktoria of Ashes casts Sisters in Fury, blends two of the Torakage and companions to Viktoria of Blood who kills the last. Conor has seen enough and concedes 10 - 0. I felt rather sorry for Conor; he'd just finished a very hard game in round 2 and told me that he had not really managed to get his head right to play our game. I believe that his plan was to swamp my side of the board with Torakage and start scoring for his schemes, leaving the rest of the crew to pick off anything I left in range. But he ended up using too many resources burying the Torakage and was consistently a half inch out on his critical positioning throughout the game. I took Conor out for a couple of pints to commiserate him since we had almost the entire round time left by the time we got finished. Anyway, Conor was a total gentleman throughout this rather one-sided game and was quite apologetic that he'd capitulated so easily. Round 4 on the Sunday was against a contender for top Gremlin; a local I've never played before.

Game 2: Outcasts (me) vs Arcanists (Mark) Strategy: Turf War, standard deployment Schemes Pool: Convict Labour, Hunting Party, Mark for Death, Set Up, Show of Force Outcasts: Hunting Party, Show of Force Arcanists: Hunting Party, Mark for Death Crews Outcasts: Viktoria of Ashes (Sisters in Spirit, Sisters in Fury, Synchronised Slaying), Viktoria of Blood (Oathkeeper, Mark of Shezuul), Freikorps Librarian, 2 Freikorps Trappers, Johan, Malifaux Child, Taelor (Scramble, Oathkeeper) Arcanists: Kaeris (Seize The Day, Blinding Flame, Purifying Flame), Firestarter (Imbued Energies), Howard Langston (Imbued Protection), Johana, Willie the Demolitionist, Gunsmith, Union Miner I went for the Viktorias here in order to leverage Mark of Shezuul for the expected tide of Steam Arachnids, with Taelor and Johan in the crew for their powers against constructs. I'm not sure why I bothered with Scramble on Taelor as I don't usually find the extra movement worth it without needing the Unimpeded too; probably I should have put Scout The Field up instead simply to score Show of Force. The Malifaux child is a handy option for activation control and sometimes can save an AP from Viktoria of Ashes by casting Sisters in Fury for her. The Trappers were in to take advantage of the relatively open board. In the end, I was quite surprised not to see Ramos here, but at least Langston would be worth trading Taelor for. Since Mark had only two minions I took Hunting Party (and anyway, Viktoria of Blood is pretty good at incidentally carving down minions via Whirlwind). Turn 1: We move up, the Trappers taking pot shots mainly at the Union Miner. Langston moves up and makes his steam cloud and Kaeris sets the Union Miner on fire so that he'll heal up at the end of the turn. The Malifaux Child casts Sisters in Fury. When the Firestarter moves up quite close to Langston (to take advantage of the cloud I suppose) I realised that it hadn't occurred to me that Mark might not have seen the Viks Slingshot before as he's been a regular at tournaments since Malifaux 1.5. It's a bit late now so I demonstrate the principle by launching Viktoria of Blood into Langston, killing him and the Firestarter and making Mark burn a few Soulstones fruitlessly trying to keep the latter standing. Lucky for me that Mark is such a cheery chap as it ended up being a bit of a 'gotcha' moment. Turn 2: Kaeris sets Viktoria of Blood on fire and the follow up attacks from the Union Miner leave her on one wound. That's enough though as she vaporises the Miner (scoring for Hunting Party in the process) and puts a few wounds on to Willie. Willie closes up the distance to drop some blasts. The Trappers ping a couple of shots into Johana and the Gunsmith misses Taelor. The Malifaux Child puts up Sisters in Fur and , improbably, manages to cast Misplaced Sympathy on Viktoria of Ashes, thereby healing her sister. Johana uses Open Revolt to heal some nearby Arcanists before the Librarian kills the Gunsmith. Taelor uses Oathkeeper and smashes Kaeris; she's followed by Viktoria of Blood who leaves the Arcanist master on one remaining wound. I score for Show of Force and Turf War. Turn 3: Willie Marks Viktoria of Blood for Death and hurts her a bit. Viktoria of Ashes blends Johana and Kaeris. The Librarian heals Viktoria of Blood (so she won't die in the explosion when Willie dies), then the latter carves down the Demolitionist. Outcasts win 10 - 0. As always, playing Mark is a lovely experience as he's always smiling and enjoying the game. He took the Viks Slingshot in his stride and, though I am still quite surprised he's never seen it before, I should have offered to tell him about the crew before we started. There's not a lot to be learned from this as an Outcast player I think. With one game of the first day still to go, I was happy to be drawn against Conor who had traveled up from England to take part. I love to play against new faces at tournaments; variety is the spice of gaming.

This weekend was the biggest Malifaux event of the calendar in Scotland, the Scottish GT. Each year surpasses the last with a record 44 players from across the UK and beyond signed up. Joe, Ben, Gareth and I drove out to Common Ground Games in Stirling and for perhaps the first time ever, actually managed to arrive on time. With so many players, it was not possible for the TO to keep people from regular gaming groups apart, so my first game was against my most regular opponent: Gareth. Game 1: Outcasts (me) vs Ten Thunders (Gareth) Strategy: Guard The Stash, corner deployment Schemes Pool: Convict Labour, Frame for Murder, Leave Your Mark, Undercover Entourage, Show of Force Outcasts: Frame for Murder (Jack Daw), Show of Force Ten Thunders: Frame for Murder (female Illuminated), Show of Force Crews Outcasts: Jack Daw (Writhing Torment, Twist and Turn, Firing Squad Injustice, Guillotine Injustice, Drowning Injustice), Freikorps Librarian, Freikorps Trapper, Taelor (Scramble), Guilty, Rusty Alyce (Desolate Soul) Ten Thunders: Misaki (Recalled Training, Stalking Bisento, Hidden Agenda), Sensei Yu (Servant of Five Dragons, Wandering River Style), Oiran, 2 Illuminated, Yamaziko, Kang Considering that there were 43 other players, it was a bit of a weird start to the day to get matched up with Gareth as we play each other very frequently. I had big doubts about this game as the strategy and scheme pool looked really good for Jack Daw, but I'm wary of playing him into Ten Thunders as they can kill him so easily with all their positive flips. In the end, I decided to go for it with a slightly elite crew to score on the strategy. Taelor got Scramble to get her through all those forests. When I saw Gareth's crew, I knew I'd be losing pieces left and right to Misaki (he's pretty good at killing my miniatures with her) so I went for Frame For Murder on Jack Daw - I might as well make the best of it. With upgrades on both Alyce and Taelor I opted for Show of Force as the other scheme. Turn 1: The Guilty makes Alyce Tormented. Sensei Yu fires Misaki across the board, making her Fast in the process. My Trapper guns down the Oiran. Jack Daw makes Taelor Tormented, she moves up and is promptly cut in half by Misaki. Ouch! Turn 2: Jack hurts Misaki, she pokes him back a bit. My Guilty kills Misaki off (no points for it, but it'll be a short game if I can't get her under control). The female Illuminated moves up and is eventually killed by Alyce, giving up 3VP for Frame For Murder. In retrospect I should have seen that coming, but I suppose I needed to kill her at some point. The other Illuminated moves up in clear sight of the Librarian; I opt to use Furious Casting for some minor damage instead of moving the Librarian up to actually score on the strategy. Yamaziko comes round the corner and smites Jack Daw a few times since I'd forgotten that she also got positive flips on masters. I guess I'm not going to have to fake Frame For Murder on him anyway. I score for Show of Force but neither of us get anything on the strategy. Turn 3: Yamaziko finishes off Jack Daw, scoring me the points on Frame for Murder, Nimbles over to the Trapper and drops some damage on him and the Guilty. The Trapper pushes free and pings a couple of pointless shots off the Illuminated along with the Librarian but still fail to kill it; it charges in to keep the Librarian pinned away from the Stash markers. The Guilty is unable to escape from Yamaziko and Alyce and Kang trade punches on the left. Gareth scores for Guard the Stash and Show of Force. Turn 4: Kang kills Alyce. The Trapper shoots Yu a couple of time for minimal impact and the Illuminated makes much easier work of the Librarian the she was making of him. The Guilty moves to make sure I score the strategy and Yu Airbursts the Illuminated back into the fray. We both score for the strategy and Gareth scores Show of Force again. Turn 5: This'll be short as all my stuff is dead! The Trapper misses Yu again; I was hoping for a lucky shot to drop him and deny Gareth the points for Show of Force at least. Yamaziko kills the Guilty and the Illuminated polishes off the Trapper. Gareth again scores for the strategy and Show of Force. Outcasts lose 5 - 9 (1 for Guard the Stash, 3 for Frame for Murder and 1 for Show of Force for me; 3 for Guard the Stash, 3 for Frame for Murder and 3 for Show of Force for Gareth). Gareth played a great game to deny me on what I needed. The funny thing is that although we play all the time, the record is very much in my favour and we've never met in a M2E event. So in the car, Gareth had joked that he wouldn't go easy on me if this was the day we did get matched up... and indeed he did not. I probably should have selected a different master as Jack Daw is a bit too much at the mercy of Ten Thunders, but Gareth is pretty experience now at using the Misaki missile to kill whatever he wants dead. I made a big mistake with the Librarian in attacking the Illuminated; I should definitely have gone for the points in turn 2; in the end it might not have mattered but in a close game I couldn't have afforded to let that go. So after a defeat, I was down the tables to meet Mark. Operation: Submarine was on.

Wow, what a great report! I love the terrain and painted miniatures; the pictures make it really cleat what is going on. It seemed that you both got really caught up in just killing each others models and forgot about scoring. I'm not familiar enough with Gremlins to comment on the crew composition, but I think that the Outcast crew would really have benefited from taking a slightly less elite crew so they'd have someone around to actually pick up the heads that the Viks, Taelor et al are scattering about the place.

Nice pictures! Looks like a good event. The terrain is particularly pretty; I like thematic boards.

Welcome to the forums. I believe that is the original miniature for the Desolation Engine. You can see a comparison with this and the new plastic version on GMort's excellent blog and community resource here. Edit: ninjaed!

Here are the three Guilty for my Malifaux Outcasts. They are thematically linked with Jack Daw (more on him later) as they share the Tormented keyword. This allows them to be pushed around by Jack Daw when they're near him, and also allows him to copy their actions. They are quite effective cheap scheme runners, but I find that they compete too much with Freikorpsmen if I'm not using Jack Daw. They have an action which allows other pieces to gain the Tormented characteristic so I usually take at least one with Jack Daw to allow me to spread that around my non-Tormented pieces. Taelor, Johan and Rusty Alyce particularly love to be Tormented near Jack Daw; the first two so that they can mitigate their painful slowness and the last so she can push into place for a cheeky Rapid Fire at a miniature that felt safe. I really liked to paint these three chaps as they have such character. In retrospect I think that I might have been best to paint them partly assembled due to the number of undercuts caused by the strapping on the bed guy and the whole chair of the seated guy. Often when painting sets like this I try to tie them together somehow but the Guilty are all so completely different that I just treated them as individuals and went wild. I assume that these are mostly intended to be based on the ghosts in the courtroom from Ghostbusters (2?). It does look silly that they are strolling about the Malifaux battlefield with all this furniture attached to them, but there is so much silliness in Malifaux that this isn't really the thing that would break my suspension of disbelief. I was trying to get the sheets here to look like surgical drapes by painting them white and colouring them only with green washes, but it didn't work out quite the way I hoped. Still, I was happy enough with the end results... and anyway didn't fancy going back to mess with painting around the strapping again to be interested in revisiting the paint. The pajamas on Mr Electric Chair were a similar unsuccessful attempt at simulating surgical gowns. I chose pink for the electric sparks simply because that was the only way I could think to get the colour onto this model. The cross guy was the easiest to paint as he isn't full of annoying undercuts, but also my least favourite now that he is painted; I'm just not satisfied with my colour choices. Still, I'm not likely to need three in a single crew.

Beautiful painting in all cases, but the idea with Candy really sets these apart from others.

Even if they're not yours, these are still truly amazing looking miniatures. You can get space for hosting the photos on various photo websites. Or you can start a blog and host them there (that is what I use to host mine).

Thank you everyone; I really appreciate the kind words. Keget - thanks for pointing that out; I've corrected the crew now to remove the Ronin who were indeed there only via copy/paste error. The more I think about how I write these reports, the less I'm sure that I'm really getting across the right information about how critical positioning is. The photos might help somewhat but I increasingly find that the difference between a win and a loss is about placing miniatures very particularly to allow options for you and deny them for your opponent. Anyway, the reports help me with this so I'll just have to hope that they are of some value to everyone else.

Game 3: Outcasts (me) vs Arcanists (Graham) Strategy: Collect The Bounty, normal deployment Schemes Pool: Convict Labour, Exhaust Their Forces, Show Of Force, Catch and Release, Detonate The Charges Outcasts: Convict Labour, Detonate The Charges Arcanists: Exhaust Their Forces, Detonate The Charges Crews Outcasts: Leveticus (Tally Sheet, Desolate Soul), 2 Hollow Waifs, Taelor (Oathkeeper), 2 Freikorps Trappers, Johan, 2 Ronin, Hodgepodge Effigy Arcanists: Marcus (Feral Instincts, Hunger Cry, Trail of the Gods), Myranda (Imbued Energies), 2 Canine Remains, Howard Langston (Imbued Energies), Mechanical Rider (Imbued Energies), Jackalope By this point in the weekend I was tired out and didn't want to go for anything too complex, so I went with my default Leveticus crew and put Taelor in it for Alyce in case of a lot of summoning. There were a few good points to put Trappers so I took two; if the lines engaged on a wide front I planned to use them to drop markers for Convict Labour, otherwise I dedicated that job to the Ronin and Effigy. I picked Detonate The Charges partly because I didn't really fancy the other schemes and partly because I figured if I was dropping markers for Convict Labour anyway then I might be able to get some of Graham's stuff to blunder into them. Turn 1: The Canine Remains both bite Langston and the Mechanical Rider to turn them into beasts. The Trappers take pot shots at the Mechanical Rider and Myranda heals it a bit. Otherwise we just jockey for position a bit. Turn 2: Johan hurts Langston and is Decapitated by the first part of a return Flurry. Leveticus kills Langston and summons an Abomination (I'm in doubt about whether the annoyance value I could get out of the Abomination was worth the risk of giving up Bounty points for it) and the Jackalope just to get it out of my face. Marcus races across the board and turns both Taelor and the Ronin into beasts, then domesticates them both. The Rider shoots at the left Trapper, dropping a scheme marker into the middle of a clump of my crew and summons a Metal Gamin. The Trappers both put a few shots into the Mechanical Rider then the Gamin and Abomination poke each other ineffectually. Myranda becomes a Cerberus which takes a cagey approach and the Ronin and Taelor both fail to escape Marcus's clutches. The rest of my crew on the right drop scheme markers I score for Convict Labour. Turn 3: Marcus Howls, make Taelor a beast and kills the Ronin. He then Domesticates and hits Taelor and companions to the Cerberus. It charges Taelor but I manage to flip two severes on prevention flips to avoid her taking any damage at all. The Trapper on the left drops a Canine Remains before being shot again by the Mechanical Rider, which summons another Metal Gamin. Leveticus kills the Rider and the new Metal Gamin. The old Metal Gamin kills my Abomination and the other Trapper kills the second Canine Remains. We both score 2 for Detonate The Charges and I also score for Collect The Bounty and Convict Labour. Turn 4: Taelor hurts the Cerberus which jumps up and eats the wounded Trapper. The Ronin, finally making into the action from the far right flank, kills the Metal Gamin. Marcus smacks Taelor around and Leveticus and the Trapper join forces to kill the Cerberus. I score again for Collect The Bounty and Convict Labour. Turn 5: Marcus takes extra damage and melee expert then kills Taelor and rushes over to make the Ronin a beast. The Ronin Flurries him back and does Seppuku to stop Marcus from passing damage on to her. Leveticus nearly kills Marcus and the Effigy finishes him off. I score for the strategy. Outcasts win 9 - 2 (4 for Collect The Bounty, 3 for Convict Labour and 2 for Detonate The Charges for me; 2 for Detonate The Charges for Graham). I had a great time playing against Graham and I always find it a challenge when I'm up against Marcus as he has so many cool tricks. I gave up swinging at Marcus too easily on turn 2; I should have forced some Soulstones out of him at least with a focused attack from Taelor. I think that Graham made a poor choice of schemes as he was never in a position to score on Exhaust Their Forces; even if he did get enough extra bodies out there to make it a reasonable proposition I would have had a lot of ways to ensure scoring Collect The Bounty with all the armour-ignoring things in my crew. I'm still undecided about the value of summoning nuisance pieces (i.e. the Abomination in this case) in Collect The Bounty; on the one hand it's a free Bounty point but on the other hand it wastes some valuable AP which could allow my heavy hitters to swing the game my way elsewhere. Once all the scores are in, I have achieved a creditable second place behind Martin and ahead of Maria on VP difference. As with all Nate's events this was superbly run with everything being handled smoothly. Thanks to Nate for the great organisation, and to Marcus, Martin and Graham for 3 fun games of Malifaux.

Game 2: Outcasts (me) vs Resurrectionists (Martin) Strategy: Extraction, normal deployment Schemes Pool: Convict Labour, Hunting Party, Show Of Force, A Quick Murder, Occupy Their Turf Outcasts: Hunting Party, A Quick Murder (Carrion Emissary) Resurrectionists: Show Of Force, Occupy Their Turf Crews Outcasts: Leveticus (Tally Sheet, Desolate Soul), 2 Hollow Waifs, Rusty Alyce (Desolate Soul, Oathkeeper), Taelor (Oathkeeper), 2 Freikorps Trappers, Johan, Hodgepodge Effigy [edit: corrected; thanks Keget!) Resurrectionists: Nicodem (Maniacal Laugh, Love Thy Master, Undertaker), Mortimer (Corpse Bloat), Philip and the Nanny (Take Back The Night, Necrotic Preparation), Nurse, Carrion Emissary (Carrion Conflux), Chiaki (Pull Of The Grave) I knew that this would be a tough game with Martin as he's really strong with Resurrectionists. I hoped that I could keep the expected summoning under control with Taelor and also make some use of Desolate Soul to possibly do a little summoning myself. When I saw the crew I thought my best option would be to try to swamp the Informant marker early on and then try to escort it back away from Nicodem's summoning while staving off the inevitable swarm of Punk Zombies. I hoped to use my large number of henchmen and enforcers to score Hunting Party against the summoned minions. The Emissary was going to need to die early on anyway so I picked A Quick Murder against it. Turn 1: The Nurse and Chiaki drop scheme markers which Philip eats for cards. Mortimer throws out a couple of corpse markers and a Trapper Black Jokers a shot at Nicodem (hoping to drain some resource). Nicodem raises Mindless Zombies then turns them into a Rotten Belle and a Hanged, making the former Fast. The Nurse Lures Johan in and the Hanged and the Emissary put him down to his Hard To Kill wound. Turn 2: Leveticus fails to put even a single wound on the Emissary. Chiaki fails to finish off Johan so I activate him to kill the Mindless Zombie from the Shards (scoring a point for Hunting Party). One Trapper kills Chiaki and the other puts some damage into the Emissary. Nicodem summons a Punk Zombie and uses it to hurt Alyce. Taelor kills the Emissary for A Quick Murder. The Belle Lures the right-hand Trapper into the open. We both score for Extraction and Martin scores Show Of Force; I move the Informant marker back towards my board edge. Turn 3: Taelor kills the Punk Zombie (for Hunting Party) and puts up Welcome To Malifaux. The Nurse stops Leveticus from doing anything but walking. The Hanged does its Whispers on Taelor, the Belle Lures her and Mortimer puts her down to a single wound. Philip even attacks her, but flips the Black Joker. The Trappers put shots into the Nurse and Nicodem and Alyce Rapid Fires at Nicodem to try to force some resources out of him. Nicodem heals himself with corpse counters, finishes Taelor himself and summons another Hanged and Punk Zombie. The latter kills a Waif and the former finishes Alyce. We both score for the strategy, I move the marker again, and Martin gets another point for Show Of Force. Turn 4: Leveticus finally shows what he can do by killing both Hanged and the Belle, summoning an Abomination from the Belle to try to pin Nicodem back a little. The Punk Zombie polishes off one Trapper. Mortimer makes short work of the Abomination and my surviving Trapper runs round to act as an Anchor for Leveticus. Nicodem summons a Punk Zombie and nearly kills the Trapper with it. We score again for Extraction and Martin gets the last point for Show Of Force. Turn 5: One Punk Zombie smacks Leveticus, who walks away and kills the Nurse. Nicodem summons a Doxy which pushes the Punk Zombie away from the centreline; they are joined by the other Punk Zombie to score Occupy Their Turf. The Effigy is unable to keep Mortimer or Philip away from the Informant Marker so Outcasts lose 9 - 10 (4 for Guard The Stash, 3 for A Quick Murder and 2 for Hunting Party for me; full score for Martin). Wow, what a great game! I gave my best shot there, trying to force a high engagement line and then fall back with the Informant marker in order to force Nicodem (or his summons) to use his AP for walking toward the scoring zone rather than just killing all my stuff. Still, a 10 - 9 defeat to a player of Martin's calibre is still no mean feat. Looking back, I should have put a bit more priority into killing the Nurse before the Emissary as the threat of her Take Your Meds (and the actuality of it in turn 3) was quite significant. I also tried to spend some effort making sure that Nicodem was on the back foot by putting Trapper and Alyce bullets into him, but Martin is very canny about where he needs to spend cards and where he can save them.

The second part of Fated Festival was a much more straightforward 50SS Gaining Grounds event, probably just as well after the mind-bending mystery of Sins of the North. Game 1: Outcasts (me) vs Arcanists (Marcus) Strategy: Guard The Stash, normal deployment Schemes Pool: Convict Labour, Take Prisoner, Leave Your Mark, Search The Ruins, Public Demonstration Outcasts: Convict Labour, Search The Ruins Arcanists: Take Prisoner (Taelor), Public Demonstration Crews Outcasts: Leveticus (Tally Sheet, Desolate Soul), 2 Hollow Waifs, Taelor (Oathkeeper), Freikorps Trapper, Freikorps Librarian, Johan, 2 Ronin, Hodgepodge Effigy Arcanists: Marcus (Feral Instincts, Trail of the Gods), Cassandra (Practiced Production), Cerberus (Imbued Energies), The Firestarter (Imbued Energies), 2 Molemen, Dawn Serpent, Malifaux Raptor Yes, I did find myself playing against a man called Marcus, using the Malifaux master Marcus. With Guard the Stash and a lot of blocking hard cover I was expecting to see Ramos and a lot of Steam arachnids here so I took Taelor to try to keep on top of the summoning (or at least force activation order decisions). Leveticus has felt strong for me against Arcanists as they have plenty of pieces that rely on armour to keep them safe; this crew has a lot of ways to ignore armour. Given that I was expecting to fight in the centre, I decided to go back to my Guild roots of 'kill everything, then drop scheme markers' approach and took Search the Ruins. I thought that I could use the Ronin to go wide and drop a marker each away from the fight for Convict Labour, then swing into the centre as a sort of 'second wave' to keep me scoring on the strategy. If I was quite surprised to find myself not facing Ramos, I was astonished to see Marcus set up his entire crew in the far left corner as far away as possible from the Stash markers. Turn 1: The Cerberus Leaps up staying out of the Trapper's line of sight. Cassandra uses Practiced Production to help the Molemen advance more quickly. Leveticus, devoid of targets, walks up and drops a scheme marker. Marcus increases his walk, advances and takes Defensive Stance before the Trapper shoots him. Turn 2: The Cerberus uses Imbued Energies, Leaps (flipping the Red Joker to Marcus's irritation) and eats the left Ronin. Taelor uses Oathkeeper and beats it to death. The Molemen both sidle shiftily up to her and Marcus eventually Alphas the Dawn Serpent to join them for Public Demonstration. The Raptor moves right up into my deployment zone so the Librarian Focuses and shouts the bird to death. The Trapper Black Jokers a shot on Marcus, the surviving Ronin and the Effigy drop scheme markers and Leveticus knocks a few wounds off the Dawn Serpent. Marcus gets three points for Public Demonstration and I score for the strategy and Convict Labour. Turn 3: The Dawn Serpent hurts Taelor and Leveticus expends a silly amount of effort to kill one of the Molemen, failing even to summon an Abomination in the process. Taelor swats the Dawn Serpent out of the sky. Marcus continues to lurk around the edge of the battle with Defensive Stance and the Librarian fails to deal with the last Moleman. Meanwhile, Cassandra and the Firestarter continue to run about behind the building at the back of the board to no discernible purpose, and the rest of my crew drop a load of scheme markers. I score again for Guard The Stash and Convict Labour. Turn 4: Marcus Alphas Leveticus. Despite his dismal showing under my control, the old chap apparently has a lease of life now that he's fighting for the Arcanists, charging the Librarian and killing her then one-shotting the Effigy before disappearing into the void. Taelor kills the second Moleman, and the Trapper and Johan combine to drop Marcus down to a few wounds left. Johan is denied the kill by the Black Joker. I score Convict Labour and the strategy again. Turn 5: Marcus takes extra melee damage and beats up Leveticus, but the old man survives by eating Soulstones. In return he kills off Marcus and has enough AP left to deal the last wounds to the Firestarter. I score for Guard the Stash; Outcasts win 10 - 3 (full score for me; 3 for Public Demonstration for Marcus). Marcus was a lovely opponent, and we were both really impressed with Marcus Alpha-ing Leveticus in the fourth turn. Marcus did make a big error in making no attempt to score Guard The Stash; he couldn't afford to give up 4 points to me without a fight at all. I was quite surprised, considering the board and the presence of a Malifaux Raptor and Practiced Production, that Marcus hadn't picked Leave Your Mark. Lunch was preceded by an excellent sword-fighting demonstration, then we were on to the second round.

I think that it is likely that the factions are not identical in power level. Therefore one of them is the weakest, and it could be Guild. My experience has been that player skill is a bigger factor in determining wins and losses than choice of faction. Anecdotally, I played Ten Thunders from the start of M2E until the end of 2014, then Guild throughout 2015 and am now playing Outcasts in 2016. My results appear to be more-or-less the same across all three factions, supporting my theory that the balance between factions is close enough not to have a major impact on the game results. I keep my own data on my own torunament games and post the results in the battle report forum. I think that there is something to be said for recording the data across the wider tournament scene, and I know that Kai Young is constantly updating the rankings programming to allow capture of schemes and masters. Interpreting the data can be hard though, as it could be the case that one faction is considered to be a good 'starter' into the game (maybe this will be the case for Guild and Neverborn since they are in the starter box) and hence have a disproportionate number of inexperienced players using them in events and hence bringing down the mean score per player for that faction. So in summary, I don't consider Guild to be meaningfully weaker than other factions. More tournament data would be great even if it is hard to interpret.

Thanks Mutter! I think that the prevalence of Leveticus is more of a perception thing on the forums. Since both Daniello_S and I have been blogging about him there is a lot of exposure in this sub-forum. In general I don't see a lot of Leveticus at tournaments (actually, I think I never faced Leveticus) and my recent experience has been that Marcus is everywhere. Of course, the sample size is tiny so it probably has no meaning. Maria is a really top draw Outcast player. She (and everyone else I meet at events) seems to select master based on the critical criterion of 'what will be fun'. I can't presume to speak for her though, that is just my impression.

Really looking forward to this. The last 3 years have all be excellent.