Argentbadger

Furycat, Dave, Joe, Andrew and I drove over to Common Ground Games in Stirling for my final Malifaux event of the year: ‘Twas The Night Before Christmas. I chose to predominantly use Jack Daw to widen my experience with Outcasts; I find him quite good fun as he, like Tara, is not a predominantly killing master and I am trying to learn to play with more shenanigans and less just wiping out the other crew as quickly as possible. This was a story event, so each round was (somewhat loosely) linked to an overall story of the Krampus doing various things related to present delivery etc. The Strategy for each round was set up as attacker versus defender; the attackers’ role was the same for all crews in that round but the defenders could get 4 different victory conditions based on a card flip. In general the Strategies were quite reminiscent of those from Malifaux 1.5. For the first 3 games, the Krampus (who is a raging murder machine) would be part of the attacker crew; the defender got a paltry 3 additional Soulstones to make up for this. Once in the event it was allowed to choose the faction scheme instead of A Line in the Sand, but since the Outcast scheme is awful I didn’t bother. Game 1: Outcasts (me) vs Guild (Martyn Nicol) Strategy: Twas the jail break before Christmas (Attacker: interact with a jail terrain piece to free the Krampus, then get it back to their deployment zone; Defender: kill the Krampus) Schemes Pool: Line in the Sand, Make Them Suffer, Bodyguard, Cursed Object, Breakthrough Outcasts: Bodyguard (Rusty Alyce), Cursed Object Guild: Line in the Sand (announced), [I forgot to note the second scheme] Crews Outcasts: Jack Daw (Writhing Torment, Twist and Turn, Firing Squad Injustice, Guillotine Injustice, Drowning Injustice), Freikorps Librarian, 2 Freikorps Trappers, Freikorpsman, Guilty, Rusty Alyce, Johan Guild: Perdita Ortega (Trick Shooting, Aura Ancestral), Francisco Ortega (Wade In), Nino Ortega (Hair Trigger), Enslaved Nephilim, 2 Hunters, Watcher, Guardian, Krampus My opponent, Martyn, turned out to be almost brand new to Malifaux. In fact so much so that he didn’t own a crew and was being brought along by a friend who had managed to misplace the crew that was going to be loaned to him. Luckily I had my Guild with me and, with some discussion with Martyn, constructed a crew that would be OK for the 4 games to play even if it was not optimised. I talked him though the simple interactions of the pieces he wasn’t familiar with and it was agreed that if he wanted to change any of the pieces then we could discuss it between rounds. So it was (at least for Martyn) probably not ideal that we met in round one [for anyone wondering about the lack of Austringers, mine were at home in the painting queue and I had previously returned Joe’s]. Of course, I picked Jack Daw and his usual set up of upgrades first. I took a Guilty to make other cool things Tormented for extra use with Jack’s various interactions, and then a suite of Freikorps as I find them excellent toolkits to get points scored. I love Alyce as a big damage dealer; with the additional pushes available when Tormented she is very hard to hide from. Similarly Johan can deliver some serious punch for his cost and also brings some helpful condition removal. Turn 1: Perdita walks up and charges a Trapper that I've foolishly left too advanced but improbably he survives. My Guilty makes Johan Tormented. Francisco uses El Mayor on Nino who was surprisingly not deployed via From The Shadows. My Trapper on the right misses a Focussed shot at the Nephilim and Johan gratefully takes his push from Jack and charges Perdita, bonking her mightily with his hammer. The Trapper who survived Perdita's attentions hands her a Cursed Object, pushes out of melee and plinks a Hunter. Jack Daw makes Alyce Tormented but fails to do anthing else. She pushes and walks forward then misses the Hunter anyway. Half of Martyn's crew are bunched up behind the prison. I score for Cursed Object. Turn 2: Johan Flurries Perdita, helpfully top-decking the Red Joker for damage on the first swing and killing her straight off. That was unexpected, but it'll make my life much simpler. Francisco refreshes El Mayor on Nino and opens the jail; one Trapper shoots him to little effect. The Krampus, free of his prison, saunters over and smites most of the wounds off my poor Freikorpsman before receiving a Cursed Object in return. The Guardian Protects the nearby Watcher. Rusty Alyce Rapid Fires and blows away the Hunter who evaded her last turn. The Librarian hurts the Krampus, and my other Trapper shoot another couple of wounds off the Francisco so Nino guns him down in revenge. My Guilty ineffectually pokes the Watcher mainly to tie it up, then Jack Daw (slightly to my suprise) kills the Krampus by dropping Firing Squad Injustice on it, the ripping the upgrade right off again. Sadly, this does stop me scoring for Cursed Object this turn, but on the other hand it does pretty much guarantee me the win by getting me 4 VP for the Strategy and stopping Martyn from scoring it at all. Turn 3: Johan kills the Guardian and Francisco heals himself and takes a Focused shot into Jack Daw. The Librarian misses the Hunter twice and it misses her right back. The Guilty passes a Cursed Object to the Watcher. Nino Rapid Fires Jack Daw and I nearly lose my master to a Headshot which would have been quite embarrassing. I guess I need to be very careful about attackers with built-in positive flips. On a roll with Nino, the Nephilim tries to Influence him for another shot but can't make it. My Freikorpsman, glad to be alive after the mauling the Krampus gave him, charges Francisco and hurts him quite badly and Jack follows him in, killing the Nephilim as an incidental attack. I score for Cursed Object. Turn 4: The Hunter kills my Librarian and Jack polishes off Francisco and Nino. The Watcher escapes from the Guilty's clutches, but only into the waiting arms of Johan, who turns it into scrap. The Trapper hands a Cursed Object to the Hunter. Martyn has seen enough so we call it there. Outcasts win 10 - 1 (full score for me; 1 for Line in the Sand). Martyn was a really nice opponent, and he only revealed after we finished that he isn't really a gamer as such at all, and was just coming along to keep his friend company. Considering that, I have to say that he really impressed me with his familiarity with the rules. I hope that he gets bitten by the Malifaux bug and starts joining in with more of our events as I think he has the potential to become quite good if he gets to grips with the game a bit more. From my side, it was the easiest possible start to the event, playing against a crew that I knew inside out (and indeed had picked myself) piloted by a highly inexperienced player. It was quite nice to be able to try Jack Daw out with his various upgrades, though I think I need to be a little bit less aggressive with him. It seems that he should perhaps be played slightly more passively as his surprising mobility makes it quite easy to move to far to support his Tormented crew (spoiler alert: I don't learn that lesson in this event).

LusciousMcCabe - thank you! This is a pair of Freikorps Trappers for the Outcasts in Malifaux, though they are Mercenaries and so can be hired in any faction. Trappers have a ridiculous reputation on the Wyrd forums which I think is partly hyperbolic, but it is certainly true that they are strong pieces. They’re not too expensive, have tolerable survivability for their cost and pack a very good gun. I would think that only the most open of boards would allow them the sort of dominance that some players report, but having built-in positive flips to attack and an increased range when focused does mean that it can be hard to hide effectively. From The Shadows allows them to start in an ideal sniper spot, though this can be annoying when deploying first as mine often find that something else horrible is hiding in the same place (frequently a Katanaka Sniper, who did remember to bring a sword unlike the Trapper who only packs a knife). In the interests of making it possible to tell which Trapper is which, I left the cape off one of them. The back isn’t covered in detail but I think it looks OK. Otherwise, the paint work is the same as used on the Freikorpsmen and will appear again on the other Freikorps pieces. Strangely only one comes in the Von Schill box, which is currently the only normal way to acquire these chaps in plastic so the second is a ‘free’ temporary addition to the Guilty As Charged box and comes in dayglo pink plastic.

Here is the Nothing Beast for my Malifaux Outcasts. Thematically it is linked with Tara, Herald of Obliteration (more on her later) and acts a big fighting option. To be honest, I think it might be a little over priced; Outcasts have a lot of competition at the 10 soulstone mark and I’m not really sure that the Nothing Beast offers more than Hannah, Taelor or Bishop for the same price. Still, it is quick around the table and has a mighty melee range, so it probably has an interesting place in an Interference crew for example. Against crews without much in the way of casting attacks, the Nothing Beast’s survivability can be quite good thanks to Incorporeal. At least in a Tara crew, I think I prefer to spend the extra couple of soulstones and take Killjoy; Tara can fix Killjoy’s lack of mobility and doesn’t really benefit much from the Nothing Beast. I was tempted to paint the Nothing Beast boring black since it meant to be a creature of the void, but opted for a more entertaining pink (Void Wretches will be the same when I get round to them). It seemed out-of-character to have different parts be different colour though, so it is pink all over. I took the highlighting up to white on the edge of some parts simply to liven up the look of it on the table.

Great painting. I like the contrast between the natural tones you use for the clothing and the bright fire effects.

Lovely painting all round. The white on Ikiryo is really smooth - do you use lots of thin layers or is there some other way to get the effect? My favourite is Lust though.

Nice painting! I like the pink spot colour. What is the little dog? Used as a Guild Hound I guess, but where is it from? Also, who is hiding behind mounted McCabe?

Excellent battle report, thank you for sharing it. How do you find Santiago? I always have trouble getting any value out of Trigger Happy because he has to focus to shoot victims in cover and so any additional shots are at a negative flip. I felt it was probably a mistake sending Lady Justice directly after Perdita. Possibly she would have been more effective targetting other members of your crew (ideally Francisco); Perdita at Df 9 is a big ask for anyone to attack directly.

Flippant replies aside, this is the crux of the thread. The question here from the OP (inference on my part, of course) is simply 'how can I get better at this game.' For me, this is a well phrased and specific way to ask that very general question. While it is very easy to say 'the skilled player wins the game' the interesting part is, as should happen in most events, you meet a player of equal skill: how do you gain the edge that takes you to the victory? I've played a lot of Sonnia in the UK tournament scene this year so the rest of my post is based on my personal experience; other gaming groups might not see the same distribution of factions, skilled players, terrain or other variables. I'm not going to touch here on terrain or strategy / scheme pools, as that would need an essay bigger than even PullMyFinger would require. Let us assume that the terrain and scheme pools are such that you would feel comfortable playing Sonnia (or that you've committed to her for some personal reason); therefore I'll focus only on the potential match ups. Guild: In general I'm fine with playing Sonnia into Guild. If both sides want a straight up firefight, Sonnia is well equipped to deliver on your side. You obviously need to take care with positioning against very shooty crew. Gremlins: I don't have a lot of experience here and but a lot of Gremlin crews focus on numerical advantage by taking large numbers of relatively cheap options such as Bayou Gremlins. Sonnia is well placed to deal with that kind of crew. Ten Thunders: I like Sonnia well enough into Ten Thunders. Mei Feng can do double or triple Vent Steam to make it hard to target her, but that comes at the cost of her own tricks and might arguably be worth allowing if it gives you a chance to focus on pieces outside the cloud. Hungering Darkness absolutely hates to see Sonnia as it is almost the best target in the game for Flame Burst. You'll also occasionally catch a Shenlong player on autopilot lighting their own master on fire. Neverborn: Sonnia provides a good answer to Dreamer (crowd control) and Pandora (due to her extraordinary attack statistic). Other masters feel like a reasonable match up. Arcanists: Malifaux Raptors and Soulstone Miners can be a big pain to play around unless you bodyguard yourself well. Sonnia can make Ramos's life very difficult by clearing out his summons. Most of the Arcanists are quite sad if you can catch them in Disrupt Magic. But Arcanists can also bring some very mobile hard hitting options such as the Blessed of December or Cerberus (and can use Myranda to get them even closer for delivery). Therefore you need to be quite wary of playing Sonnia into Arcanists. Resurrectionists: Counterspell Aura can make Rotten Belles very sad, and if playing against a summoning-focussed crew Sonnia is amazing for crowd control But on the other hand, Sonnia doesn't like to see a lot of Hard To Wound, and Kirai is a nightmare to work against using Sonnia even using Flame Wall shenanigans to avoid triggering Ikiryo. I also got beaten hard by (the admittedly very skilled) MalifauxMartin's Molly/Sybelle/Killjoy crew once, though I'm not sure that wasn't just Martin correctly counterpicking me and delivering his play very beautifully. Outcasts: I almost never choose to play Sonnia into Outcasts. Freikorps suits can shut down a lot of her most effective plays, but more importantly, I worry about meeting Tara supported by a meaningful number of Freikorps. The local wisdom here seems to be that Tara is an effective drop for Outcasts facing Guild in some schemes and she can turn off the Papa Loco / Pine Box thing very easily. Indeed, at the recent UKGT 2015 I forgot this while playing Ressurectionist Tara and got punished for it. I actually like Sonnia a lot against Jack Daw, Hamlin and the Viktorias and I can live with her against Leveticus and Misaki. You need to build up the kind of experience that will tell you 1) whether Sonnia in your hands is right for the strategy, schemes and terrain, 2) whether those factors will be likely to bring the other player to choose a particular master and 3) whether that likely master is a good fit for the way you play Sonnia. Of course, this is true for the entire game. And ZFiend does make a good point about skill - a player with a big enough skill advantage will be able to play though any perceived or actual advantage in crew selection; I've been on both sides of this. In the interests of the original true question (i.e. 'how can I improve my skill') I suggest to play Sonnia into every match up you can for a while so that you can find her limitations and strengths. I've played most of the 2015 tournament 'season' with pretty much only Sonnia and Perdita and I have not once felt that I was disadvantaged by doing so, even against the strongest players in my country. Edit: I even forgot my obligatory self-promotion! There are event reports from every tournament I've played using Guild in the Battle Report sub-forum if you're the kind of person who can learn from that kind of source. Feel free to keep asking questions - the more specific the question, the more effective an answer you might get. But don't believe all the group-think on here, including this post. Your experiences will vary from ours.

Excellent, my last event of 2015. Money sent now for Gareth and me.

I too had a great time. For me, all the important things were done correctly - boards with good terrain, nice organisation of round times, clear leadership from the TOs and fun games with other like-minded gamers. My only complaint was that I didn't get to play against any Swedes! Well, that and the fact that I was on for a rainbow up until I failed to find Gremlins and Outcasts in rounds 6 and 7. The food was OK, the scoresheet was usable and even Mike's use of the microphone was quite entertaining. TOs did a great job in everything that mattered - so thank you to all three of you. For my more specific thoughts on how the whole event looked through my eyes, I have posted in tedious glorious detail here.

Game 7: Guild (me) vs Resurrectionists (Ant Hoult) Strategy: Collect The Bounty Schemes Pool: Line in the Sand, Bodyguard, Protect Territory, Make Them Suffer, Spring The Trap Guild: Protect Territory (announced), Make Them Suffer Resurrectionists: Protect Territory (announced), Make Them Suffer Crews Guild: Sonnia Criid (Counterspell Aura, Cherufe’s Imprint), Papa Loco Ortega, Malifaux Child, Guardian, Austringer, 2 Hunters, Death Marshal, Brutal Effigy Resurrectionists: Tara (Knowledge of Eternity, Obliteration Symbiote, Eternal Journey), Dead Rider, Void Wretch, Nothing Beast (Void Shield), Necropunk, Toshiro the Daimyo (Decaying Aura, Unnerving Aura) I was quite pleased to get another try to beat Ant, who has comfortably beaten me every other time we’ve played. Neither of us were even close to in the running for winning, so in our own ways I think we both took our foot off the pedal a little. I decided to just go wild with the Flame Bursts and enjoy Sonnia setting the world on fire; Ant took, in his words ‘a fun and silly crew’. The funny thing is that I’ve generally avoided playing Sonnia into Outcasts all year in case I get Tara who can counter my usual play with Papa Loco; it didn’t occur to me even for a moment that I might see her here. I thought that I might have a chance to take out both minions early and so picked Make Them Suffer, and Protect Territory is a favourite of mine even in flank deployment (where, admittedly, it is harder than usual). It isn’t very clear in the photo but the whole Resurrectionist crew is hiding behind some buildings at the back of their deployment zone. Turn 1: The Necropunk fails to Leap, the shuffles around a bit. Tara Buries Toshiro after making him Fast. Papa Loco does Hold This and is buried by the Death Marshal. Yes, this was stupid; I know what Tara can do to Buried things. For some reason my mind just blanked on what I was doing. My stuff advances. I have a pretty awful hand so the Child fails to create a Flame Wall and Sonnia Black Jokers hers. Turn 2: Sonnia walks up, Flame Bursts the Nothing Beast who discards Void Shield to avoid a big first hit; I cheat in the Red Joker on the second to kill it anyway. The Dead Rider is badly hurt in the blasts and the Necropunk dies (scoring me a point for Make Them Suffer). Those paying more attention than I apparently was will note that I forgot yet again to activate the Brutal Effigy first. Tara Unburies Papa Loco and makes him fast. He then walks out and blows up, doing nasty damage to Sonnia and killing a Hunter. I am an idiot. The Dead Rider charges the other Hunter and drags it back towards the corner where Toshiro kills it for Make Them Suffer. I had tried to use the Malifaux Child to block the charge route with a Flame Wall but Toshiro’s Fast allowed him to reposition. Ant scores for the Strategy. Turn 3: Tara Buries Toshiro, making him fast, then Unburies him and fling him at Sonnia. She is not able to survive the onslaught. The Dead Rider is down to a single wound at this point. The Austringer Focuses and misses a shot at it. The Dead Rider attacks the Death Marshal but can’t make much of it. Almost everything I can muster attacks the Dead Rider but I can’t finish it off. In retrospect, I wasn’t going to score the Strategy anyway this turn so I might as well have attached Toshiro instead to try to bring his wounds down a bit. Ant scores for Collect The Bounty again. Turn 4: The Death Marshal kills the Dead Rider. We both have awful cards and everything flails uselessly around (all the good cards get flipped on defense); a few attacks do get through on Toshiro but he Soulstones most of the damage away. Tara Slows the Guardian and Effigy. I score on the Strategy. Turn 5: Ant rather unluckily Black Jokers the initiative flip having used his last Soulstone on Toshiro last turn. The Death Marshal kills Toshiro. Tara gives herself reactivate and runs to get in position to drop scheme markers. The Void Wretch gets pinned in place by the Guardian. The Death Marshal gets Delivered Orders by the Austringer so I have enough scheme markers down. Tara drops markers but doesn’t have enough AP to stand between them. I score for the Strategy and Guild win 6 – 5 (2 for Collect the Bounty, 3 for Protect Territory and 1 for Make Them Suffer for me; 2 for Collect the Bounty, 1 for Protect Territory and 2 for Make Them Suffer for Ant [writing this up I think I made some error in my notes as I can only see 1 point for Make Them Suffer for Ant but we were sure of it at the time]). That was a very pleasant way to end the tournament. I’m very glad to finally have a win against Ant, even if he was taking it a bit easy on me. My own play was quite sloppy, but I guess that I am in some ways quite pleased to be able to demonstrate why you should not Pine Box Papa Loco when playing against Tara. Overall I had a fantastic time at the UK GT 2015. It was terrifically well run, everyone was a perfect gentleman or lady as applicable, and most importantly I had 7 terrific games of Malifaux. When the scores came in I was 31st out of 88 players which I happy with; the field was very strong. I feel like I was at least in with a chance of winning each game if only I’d played a little more cleverly and I did beat some good players in the process. I have only two disappointment for the event. Firstly, there were a group of Swedes who had travelled over to join in the fun but I didn’t get drawn against any of them. And secondly, after 5 games I had played against 5 different factions. It would have been wonderful to ‘complete the rainbow’. As you can tell with the trivial nature of my concerns, I have almost nothing bad to say about the event. Thanks to Graham, Scott, Paul H, Martin, Paul B, Hutch and Ant for giving me 7 fun games, and to Mike, Lee and Chris for their tireless work to make everything run smoothly.

Game 6: Guild (me) vs Guild (Adam Hutchison) Strategy: Reckoning Schemes Pool: Line in the Sand, Assassinate, Protect Territory, Outflank, Power Ritual My Guild: Protect Territory (announced), Power Ritual (announced) Other Guild: Protect Territory (announced), Power Ritual (announced) Crews My Guild: Perdita Ortega (Trick Shooting), Francisco Ortega (Wade In), Guardian, 2 Hunters, Austringer, Enslaved Nephilim, Watcher, Brutal Effigy Other Guild: Hoffman (Arcanist Assets, Field Mechanic, On Site Assimilation), Brutal Emissary (Conflux of the Amalgamation), Peacekeeper, Ryle, Metal Gamin, Mobile Toolkit, Warden I have to admit, I was hoping to face either Gremlins or Outcasts here as I had gone up against the other five factions already. Normally I’d be happy to put down either Sonnia or Perdita for Reckoning, but with close deployment in the mix and Assassinate on the cards I felt much more comfortable with Perdita. I’m not a fan of super-elite Reckoning crews with only a few activations so while I looked for tougher options I did make sure to get enough pieces in my crew to allow me to actually compete on the schemes too. In particular, Slowing big hitters with the Hunters can be very useful. I picked Protect Territory because it is a scheme that can often be scored once the dust has settled and Power Ritual because I was hoping to keep my Watcher out of harms way and score a cheeky 3 points. Looking at the horrifying wall of metal facing my crew I was very glad to have chosen Perdita. Turn 1: The Toolkit gives the Peacekeeper positive flips to melee attacks. The left Hunter Chain Harpoons it for Slow. Hoffman Loops the Metal Gamin, gives it Slow in exchange for Fast (not sure why Hutch didn’t use the Peacekeeper for this since it was already Slow) and knocks some scrap out of the Peacekeeper. He then puts Patchwork Plating on the Emissary and Targeting Systems on the Peacekeeper and Machine Puppets the Peacekeeper to Focus and lose Slow. Finally he Machine Puppets the Emissary to Bury the Peacekeeper and walk to my right. Francisco moves over to give Perdita a Relocation target that will allow her a straight shot at the Emissary. Perdita takes her shots at the big robot but can’t drop it. It moves further to the right and Unburies the Peacekeeper. The Hunter fails to Chain Harpoon it, so the Peacekeeper shows it how this is done by using the Focus to put Slow on my Hunter and then missing the Brutal Effigy. Ryle heals the Peacekeeper. The Effigy Focuses and shoot Slow onto the Peacekeeper yet again. The Austringer plinks a couple of wounds off the Toolkit and the Watcher and Warden both drop scheme markers and take the long walk across the board. Finally the Guardian charges the Peacekeeper, being careful to keep outside its melee range. Turn 2: Hoffman Power Loops the Metal Gamin and makes it Slow again before creating a scrap counter which is used to heal the Emissary and the Peacekeeper. He Machine Puppets the Emissary to push toward him then walk back so he could be dragged to it. Since Hoffman is now in range of the Peacekeeper he Machine Puppets it to push out of melee and shoot the Effigy. The Emissary is then Machine Puppeted to Bury Ryle. The Guardian charges the Emissary and re-engages both it and the Peacekeeper at maximum melee range. The latter just walks deep into my crew, engaging most of my constructs on that side. The Hunter on the left Slows the Emissary, then it walks and pokes at my Effigy, then Unburies Ryle. The Austringer kills the Toolkit and Ryle scraps the Hunter on the right. I use Francisco to set up a ridiculous Relocate option but then realise that I have only 1 card in hand and it is pretty good. Instead Perdita just walks then charges the Emissary, killing it after ignoring Armour. The Metal Gamin tries to finish the Effigy with Magnetism but, with no cards in hands, Hutch obligingly flips a 1. I score Reckoning. Turn 3: The Peacekeeper Flurries the Guardian, dropping Targetting Systems in the process. Hutch has awful cards though and it survives easily. Perdita kills the Warden and puts some damage into Hoffman. He heals himself and Machine Puppets the Peacekeeper to keep hitting the Guardian but my robot just doesn’t want to go down. The Metal Gamin tries to Magnetise the Brutal Effigy again but flips the Black Joker this time. Ryle charges Perdita since I don’t have El Mayor up but he can’t land a hit. The Austringer and Hunter combine to kill the Metal Gamin and Francisco charges Hoffman and wafts his sword uselessly at him. I score for the Strategy again. Turn 4: Francisco puts El Mayor on Perdita and prods a few more wounds out of Hoffman. Perdita Companions and guns down Ryle and hurts Hoffman. Hoffman Machine Puppets the Peacekeeper to kill the Effigy at last. The Guardian Protects itself, hitting the trigger to heal a couple of wounds, then the Peacekeeper bounces off it again. Hutch has seen enough so we agree that I’ll be able to pick up my schemes and stop him scoring his, but that I won’t be likely to score more Reckoning points. My Guild win 8 – 0 (2 points for Reckoning, 3 each for Power Ritual and Protect Territory). I had a very nice time playing Hutch but his deck really didn’t like him at all that game. I felt that I had things in control even allowing for the inexplicable failure of the Peacekeeper to deal with the Guardian. The Hunters did great work for me putting Slow on his big hitters and I was very pleased to get such good mileage out of them. I knew when the Warden got diverted from his job of scoring Power Ritual that I would win the game, though the margin was bigger than I expected. That is one good thing about Watchers: they have no offensive power so it is not easy to get distracted from their scheme running.

Game 5: Guild (me) vs Guild (Paul Butler) Strategy: Turf War Schemes Pool: Line in the Sand, Bodyguard, Assassinate, Plant Evidence, Vendetta My Guild: Line in the Sand (announced), Plant Evidence (announced) Other Guild: Plant Evidence (announced), Assassinate Crews My Guild: Sonnia Criid (Reincarnation), Francisco Ortega (Wade In), Papa Loco Ortega (Hermanos De Armas), Austringer, Hunter, Watcher, Death Marshal, Witchling Stalker, Brutal Effigy Other Guild: Perdita Ortega (Trick Shooting, Os Veo), Hunter, Francisco Ortega (Wade In), 2 Guild Hounds, Abuela Ortega, Enslaved Nephilim, Brutal Emissary (Conflux of the Hunt) I have surprisingly little experience playing Guild vs Guild games and I had no idea what Paul might choose here. In the end, I opted for Sonnia Criid with the idea that I might be able to blast stuff coming in for Turf War. I was expecting some amount of shooting incoming so picked Francisco to make Sonnia herself a slightly less appealing target. I didn’t really fancy any of the schemes much so I picked Line in the Sand and Plant Evidence pretty much entirely with the idea that I was in full control of them. Turn 1: Papa Loco give Sonnia some dynamite and pulls her forward. This was a bit of a mistake; I should have put Hermanos De Armas on Francisco instead so that he could use El Mayor. Papa Loco is later tucked away into the Death Marshal’s Pine Box. The other Francisco does indeed use El Mayor on Perdita. Abuela Shotgun Weddings the Emissary into the Family (actually I’m a bit surprised that Conflux of the Hunt doesn’t do that anyway) and it eventually Buries the Hunter. The Nephilim pushes it and Abuela forward. Perdita Relocates to Francisco and guns down my Witchling Stalker which I have stupidly left wide open (though I guess she could have ignored any cover anyway). Sonnia walks up and hurts Abuela; the other two Ortegas Soulstone away their damage. Turn 2: Sonnia kills Abuela, walks and hurts the Emissary. This was a mistake as I didn’t really need to expose Sonnia at that point; I’d have been much better off using the Hunter to attack Abuela and saved Sonnia for later. I also forgot to use the Brutal Effigy before activating Sonnia. Perdita kills my Hunter and Obeys Francisco next to the Emissary. The Brutal Effigy and Watcher drop scheme markers and both Hounds run for my half of the table. The Emissary Buries Francisco moves to within 6″ of the Turf marker and Unburies both Francisco and the Hunter; the latter next to the scheme marker I’d conveniently just dropped (looking back I’m not sure that Francisco should have been Unburied at this point as it was the same activation he’d been Buried). His Francisco charges Sonnia, doing some rather nasty damage and using Finesse. My Francisco Flurries the Hunter but can’t do enough damage to kill it. With no cards in either of our hands, Paul top decks high Rams on both attacks to trigger critical strike and kill Sonnia perfectly, scoring Assassinate in the process. The Death Marshal Pine Boxes the Hunter so that I can Unbury Papa Loco and hurt his Francisco. We both score for Turf War. Turn 3: Perdita Relocates to Francisco and kills Papa Loco who explodes and hurts the Death Marshal. She companions to Francisco who rather charges and rather easily kills the Death Marshal, Unburying the Hunter in melee with my Francisco. He stabs the last wound off the Hunter and guns down the imposter Francisco. The Hounds and Watcher drop scheme markers and the Nephilim Shackles itself to one of the Hounds in order to engage the Watcher. The Effigy continues to drop scheme markers and the Emissary Red Jokers a damage flip on Francisco. We both score again on the Strategy. Turn 4: The Emissary kills Francisco and does its Tyranny Lights The Way action. One Hound gently tickles the Watcher while Perdita improbably fails to kill the Austringer. The Effigy is runs round to be near the Turf marker and the Austringer Delivers Orders to get it close enough. We both score for Turf War. Turn 5: My Effigy engages a Hound to make it a bit harder to remove my scheme markers. Perdita makes no mistake this time killing the Austringer and removes a scheme marker; the Emissary removes another. The Watch takes double Defensive Stance and somehow survives. Paul scores on the Strategy again. My Guild lose 7 – 10 (3 for Turf War, 3 for Plant Evidence and 1 for Line in the Sand; full score for Paul). Paul was a lovely gentleman to play against; it was the perfect start to a second day of gaming. I’m a bit annoyed with my play overall here as I felt that I made things far to easy for him though. In particular I was needlessly aggressive with Sonnia in turn 2. I have gotten into the habit of using her (if possible) twice in a row, i.e. once at the end of turn 1 and then as soon as possible in turn 2. But in this case only Abuela was even in range to attack by Sonnia. A much stronger play would have been to put the Hunter into Abuela as she didn’t have many wounds left, then use Sonnia when more targets were available. Oh well, live and learn.

Game 4: Guild (me) vs Arcanists (Martin Wodehouse) Strategy: Interference Schemes Pool: Line in the Sand, Distract, Breakthrough, Assassinate, Take Prisoner Guild: Breakthrough (announced), Distract Arcanists: Breakthrough (announced), Take Prisoner (Perdita) Crews Guild: Perdita Ortega (Trick Shooting), Nino Ortega (Hair Trigger), Guardian, 2 Hunters, Austringer, Enslaved Nephilim, Watcher, Brutal Effigy Arcanists: Marcus (Hunger Cry, Feral Instincts, Trail of the Gods), Myranda (Imbued Energies), Sliurid, Canine Remains, 2 Molemen, 2 Night Terrors, 3 Malifaux Raptors, Jackalope I was really unsure what kind of crew to take here. On the one hand, I like Sonnia in theory against Arcanist due to her excellent crowd control and access to Disrupt Magic. But on the other hand, she really suffers against the kind of hard-hitting mobility that Arcanists can bring, like the Cerberus in particular. The board was covered in line-of-sight blocking terrain that would make almost any form of ranges attacks tricky too. In the end I selected Perdita so that I could ignore some cover if needed, or ignore armour if something heavy was deployed. I hoped to use the Guardian to tie up multiple enemies with its big melee range, and Nino to cover the central square. Seeing Martin’s crew I was glad not to have picked Sonnia as she would have been almost their perfect prey. I picked Distract hoping to tag the Night Terrors early if possible, and Breakthrough because it is nice and easy to score in flank deployment. Turn 1: The Raptors all waste activations by Taking to the Sky. The Austringer puts some damage on the Canine Remains sneaking up the right. The Jackalope charges in and hurts Nino; he Red Jokers a damage flip in return after pushing out of combat to blow it to bits. Dang thing’ll be back soon enough. Perdita Relocates to Nino, kills the Canine Remains and drops a scheme marker. Myranda advances and turns into a Cerberus, which fails to Leap. Marcus steams over and kills the Austringer. The Raptors reappear in a corner. Turn 2: Marcus makes Nino a Beast, put him on negative flips and makes him Prey before offing the Brutal Effigy. The Hunter on the right kills a Moleman and the Jackalope pops back up. The Siluris fails to kill my Watcher. The other Hunter hurts the Night Terror. The Cerberus eats the Nephilim. Nino shuffles out of Perdita’s way and she charges Marcus, acheiving little except to draw some soulstones for Tomes; she also Distract him and the Watcher does the same to the Silurid. The rest of the Arcanists shuffle to score and the Raptors come in to engage anything I have that might be close to scoring (which is nothing anyway). Martin scores Interference, I score Distract. Turn 3: Perdita hurts Marcus. Nino pushes out of melee, misses the Jackalope and is eventually eaten by the little monster. The Hunter at the top Distracts its Night Terror; the other misses a Chain Harpoon into the Cerberus. One of the Raptors is finally killed by the Guardian (how I hate that weak damage of 1) and another finishes off the Watcher. Marcus beats Perdita suspiciously gently. The little Beasts move to score again. I score Distract and Martin scores on the Strategy. Turn 4: Perdita kills Marcus and the Jackalope. The Cerberus moves toward Perdita, confirming my belief that Martin had Take Prisoner on her. The rest of both of our crews flail uselessly at each other; the Silurid takes the opportunity to remove Distract. I am again swamped with Raptors at the end of the turn. Martin scores on Interference again. Turn 5: The Hunter kills a Raptor but misses a critical Chain Harpoon into the Cerberus. Perdita makes a run for it, but the Cerberus is able to Leap and catch up to her. Martin scores again for the Strategy and also picks up all the points for Take Prisoner. Guild lose 5 – 10 (2 for Distract and 3 for Breakthrough for me; full score for Martin). That was a really interesting game. I don’t have a lot of experience playing against Marcus or a crew like that and it probably showed. I wasn’t able to whittle down the activations fast enough to make any difference and in the end there were still a lot of the little Beasts moving about in places where I would never be able to reach them. I’m still thinking about how I would handle such a match-up in the future and I’m not certain I have a good answer yet. The Raptors are a very strong pick in Interference as they can get into position to stop me scoring and then Take to the Sky again before I have much of an opportunity to retaliate. Overall I was quite comprehensively outplayed through the match. Martin was a lovely chap to play against; one of the draws of such an event is that it is big enough to pull in players from further afield than I normally encounter. After the conclusion of day one there were some folks settling down for card games and so on, but I was a bit too tired of gaming to partake much. I enjoyed a chance to catch up with some of my friends whom I only see at tournaments, then my group headed back to the centre of town for some beer and a very fine curry. After a refreshing rest we were back even earlier for another three games.

Game 3: Guild (me) vs Resurrectionists (Paul Hansell) Strategy: Squatter’s Rights Schemes Pool: Line in the Sand, Bodyguard, Breakthrough, Frame For Murder, Power Ritual Guild: Breakthrough (announced), Power Ritual (announced) Resurrectionists: Breakthrough (announced), Power Ritual (announced) Crews Guild: Sonnia Criid (Reincarnation), Papa Loco Ortega (Hermanos De Armas), Guardian, Austringer, Hunter, Watcher, Death Marshal, 2 Guild Hounds, Brutal Effigy Resurrectionists: Nicodem (Love Thy Master, Undertaker, Manical Laugh), Mortimer (Corpse Bloat, My Favourite Shovel), Datsue Ba (Spirit Beacon, [another upgrade that I forgot to write the name of]), 2 Necropunks, Bete Noir, Rotten Belle Looking at the field, I decided to run Sonnia for a change. In general I like her for crowd control, but she is particularly weak against Kirai. I decided to risk it and was pleased when Paul chose Nicodem. The Guardian was there with the idea of using that lovely big melee range to engage a pair of Squat marker. The Hounds and Watcher would be on Power Ritual duty; if the opportunity presented itself to take a Squat Marker on the way then I would do that. We both picked Breakthrough and Power Ritual. I didn’t have anything worth using for Bodyguard and I didn’t expect Nicodem, Mortimer or Datsue Ba to be focussing on killing things directly. Turn 1: We both drop scheme markers in our own corners. Datsue Ba moves up but fails to summon a Seishin. Papa Loco give Sonnia his dynamite and pulls her forward with Hermanos De Armas. Mortimer advances and puts out a pair of corpse markers. The Death Marshal charges and Pine Boxes Papa Loco. Nicodem uses Maniacal Laugh then summons a Dead Doxy and Punk Zombie. The latter charges the Brutal Effigy but can’t land a hit. Sonnia hits Mortimer with some Flame Bursts, dropping the Punk Zombie to a single wound in the process. I summon a Witchling Stalker when it burns to death in the end phase and Bete Noir also appears. Turn 2: The Necropunk on the left takes a Squat marker. The Brutal Effigy does the same and gives Sonnia Fear Not The Sword. She blows up Mortimer and the Doxy, forces Bete Noir to bury and hurts Nicodem. The other Necropunk picks up the right hand Squat marker. On the left, the Hunter Slows Datsue Ba. Nicodem advances into the sea of corpse counters, turns them into Mindless Zombies then summons another Doxy and a Necropunk. The Doxy pushes the Necropunk and kills the Stalker to bring Bete back out. One of my Hounds charges her to stop Bete from getting stuck into Sonnia, which I definitely don’t want. The selfless act of loyalty does cost the poor dog its life. The Guardian pokes at the Necropunk on the left; the Death Marshal runs for a marker and the Austringer makes him claim it. The new Necropunk charges the lonely Hound and gets eaten in return. We both score on the Strategy. Turn 3: Datsue Ba fails to hurt the Hunter then summons a Seishin. The Effigy Focuses and shoots Nicodem then companions to Sonnia who clears out the middle but is just short of killing Nicodem. She does draw an impressive number of cards thanks to Fear Not The Sword though. Nicodem heals himself with Chime of Sorrows, summons another Punk Zombie and makes a nearby Necropunk Fast. The Watcher makes it to the far corner and drops a scheme marker. The Punk Zombie kills the Effigy. Papa Loco frees himself from the box and tries (but fails) to blow up Datsue Ba and the Necropunk after the Death Marshal has moved off to drop a scheme marker. My Hound hurts the fast Necropunk then it Leaps to take the last neutral Squat marker and return to poke the Hound. The Guardian could choose to take a Squat Marker but instead kills Datsue Ba. This brings Bete back; she kills my Hunter. We both score on Squatter’s Rights. Turn 4: Sonnia finally kills Nicodem. The Necropunk on the right continues to flail uselessly at my Hound. The Guardian moves to engage Bete Noir; the Seishin moves over to stand on a Squat Marker. The Death Marshal Focusses and hurts the Seishin. The Necropunk on the left Leaps and takes one of my Squat markers. Everything runs around scheming; Bete can’t manage to get free of my Guardian. Guild lose 8 – 9 (I get 3 for each scheme and 2 for the strategy; Paul scores 3 for everything). What a game. I really enjoyed every part of that match and Paul was a warm and friendly opponent. It felt extremely satisfying having Sonnia clearing out swathes of the undead from the centre while Nicodem was constantly raising them back up. I made a mistake in attacking Datsue Ba with the Guardian instead of taking the Squat marker in turn 3. But looking back at the game, I think I still could have scored if I’d thought properly. The Austringer could easily have killed the Seishin and let Papa Loco take that Squat marker instead. Or even I could have done it the other way round by using Deliver Orders. Anyway, for whatever reason I didn’t think of it at the time. It could have been a very interesting game to take to turn 5 too, but we ran out of time; it was a very busy game (I probably wrote about 50% more noted than usual).

Game 2: Guild (me) vs Neverborn (Scott Weldon) Strategy: Head Hunter Schemes Pool: Line in the Sand, Protect Territory, Breakthrough, Plant Explosives, Deliver a Message Guild: Protect Territory (announced), Plant Explosives Neverborn: Protect Territory (unannounced), Plant Explosives Crews Guild: Perdita Ortega (Trick Shooting, Aura Ancestral), Nino Ortega (Hair Trigger), 2 Hunters, Death Marshal, Austringer, Enslaved Nephilim, Watcher, Brutal Effigy Neverborn: Lilith (Wings of Darkness, Living Blade, Beckon Malifaux), Primordial Magic, Baby Kade (Depression), Teddy (Retribution’s Eye), Silurid, 2 Illuminated I love Head Hunter. It’s probably my favourite Strategy with a really interesting mix of killing and interacting; I think it exemplifies Malifaux at its best. I picked Perdita again, partly because she excels at single target damage and partly because the Enslaved Nephilim is beautiful in Head Hunter. The Austringer was included for similar reasons; a push and interact is great in this Strategy. I picked Aura Ancestral as it can be handy against certain Neverborn crews. I can’t even remember why I picked the Death Marshal; probably I wanted a cheap activation for picking up schemes that wouldn’t drop its own head without a fight. I considered Breakthrough but discounted it; not only is it quite hard to score in corner deployment but I also had no intention of crossing the board anyway. Turn 1: The Silurid Leaps right up into the centre of the board and drops a scheme marker. Nino can’t resist the opportunity to Rapid Fire into it. The Nephilim Shackles the top Hunter and the Austringer forward. Teddy lumbers up the middle and Kade teleports to him. The Austringer plinks another couple of wounds out of the Silurid. Lilith Tangle Shadows my Effigy into the central melee, leaving an activated Illuminated hanging around just outside my deployment zone. Perdita Relocates to Nino then shoots the Illuminated; the Hunter kills it. The top Hunter Chain Harpoons the Illuminated to make it Slow. At the end of the turn the bottom Hunter pushes onto the Illuminated’s head. Turn 2: The Hunter at the top vapourises the Illuminated with a timely Red Joker on damage. Teddy kills the Effigy and I’m trying to think of ways to stop everything moving away from the dropped scheme marker. The Watcher schemes to buy me some time; Kade helpfully spends his activation picking up the Effigy’s head. On the right, the Death Marshal picks up another. The Silurid Leaps and drops a scheme marker near my Death Marshal (looking back, I think that Spotter should have stopped that); Nino kills it. The second Hunter Slows Lilith, who uses the Red Joker to Tangle Shadows to put Perdita in melee and send the Primordial Magic to me. Perdita hurts Teddy. I attack the Primordial Magic with the Austringer, which was quite silly since I could have Delivered Orders to the Death Marshal to pick up the scheme marker near him. We both reveal Plant Explosives and score three; we also both score for Head Hunter. Turn 3: Perdita cold-bloodedly drops Teddy then Kade and hurts Lilith for good measure. Lilith hits her back to limited effect. The Austringer polishes off the Primordial Magic. Both Hunters close in on Lilith and bite her. The Death Marshal picks up another head and the Watcher, satisfied that all is going well, drops another marker and moves to sit between two of them. I score for Head Hunter. Turn 4: Scott declares his new objective: kill Perdita Ortega. Sadly I win initiative and one of the Hunters mauls Lilith to death. Guild win 10 – 4 (full score for me; 3 for Plant Explosives and 1 for Head Hunter for Scott). I apparently forgot to take a final picture, but the only change was removing Lilith and putting yet another head marker in the centre. I was much more comfortable throughout that game; I think that Scott is relatively inexperienced. I hope to meet him again when he has played a few more games as he was very enthusiastic about his Malifaux. I did make quite a big mistake in wasting the Austringer’s activation on turn 2 messing about with the Primordial Magic instead of making the Death Marshal pick up the nearby scheme marker and therefore save me from conceding 2 points (Perdita was still in range of the one in the centre).

After much anticipation, 7 Scotland-based gamers climbed into the War Rig on Friday evening and drove down to York for the Malifaux UKGT 2015. We made a proper weekend of the thing, arriving for a delicious dinner and beer before sleeping in our surprisingly luxurious hostel on the night before the event. Saturday morning saw us up and registered early, among the 88 like-minded players converging on York from around the country and beyond. Game 1: Guild (me) vs Ten Thunders (Graham Bursnell) Strategy: Stake A Claim Schemes Pool: Line in the Sand, Protect Territory, Distract, Cursed Object, Assassinate Guild: Protect Territory (announced), Cursed Object Ten Thunders: Protect Territory (announced), Assassinate Crews Guild: Perdita Ortega (Trick Shooting), Francisco Ortega (Wade In), Nino Ortega (Hair Trigger), 2 Hunters, Austringer, Enslaved Nephilim, Watcher, Brutal Effigy Ten Thunders: Misaki (Stalking Bisento), Shang, Shadow Effigy, 2 Ten Thunders Brothers, Yamaziko, Sensei Yu (Wandering River Style), Shadow Emissary (Conflux of Thunder) With seven games to play I was hoping to start off with something reasonably straightforward to get me warmed up, so I think that Graham and I both had the same thought when we were paired in the first round: why you? Still, with a field as tough as the UKGT you can’t avoid other good players for long. I find my Guild can sometimes be a bit slow to get moving so I picked Perdita pretty much solely in order to have access to the Enslaved Nephilim. I took Nino to make Graham either play around him for the Strategy, Distract and Cursed Object, or to force him to send something over to drop Nino. Thinking that I might as well go for a bit more Family if I was going to take advantage of Spotter I also took Francisco; of course it is obvious in retrospect that he would spend most of his time next to Perdita. Protect Territory is a simple scheme to score so I chose that first. I did consider picking Assassinate on Misaki as she would surely be coming to get me, but eventually I felt that Cursed Object would be a better option. Not a great photo to begin with! Turn 1: Yu Airbursts the Emissary forward and Mighty Gusts Misaki to make her Fast. Nino Rapid Fires a few wounds off the Emissary and the double Focussed return attack flips the Black Joker; the Emissary scuttles back behind a rock. The Nephilim Shackles the Austringer and a Hunter forward. Misaki Stalks the latter, charges and kills both it and Nino. Perdita fails to do much of anything to the Emissary in return. At some point I realise that I’ve forgotten to do El Mayor. Turn 2: Perdita ignores cover and blows away the Emissary in two shots; she puts a bullet into Shang for good measure. Even though there was no reason not to do it, I only notice partway though the activation that I could have used the Brutal Effigy first to pick myself up a card. The Shadow Effigy moves to engage the Watcher. Misaki kills the Austringer and hurts Francisco. The Nephilim Shackles Francisco towards my Hunter; Sensei Yu Airbursts him right back so he activates and swings wildly in Misaki’s general direction. The Watcher gives the Effigy a Cursed Object then flies away. Yamaziko Nimbles into my half of the board and drops a Claim marker. The Hunter on the left charges one of the Brothers and kills him; the other moves to engage. Graham scores for the Strategy and I score for Cursed Object. Turn 3: Francisco uses Finesse, forgets once again to do El Mayor (I am bad at this today) and cuts a few wounds out of Misaki. Misaki wafts her bisento in Perdita’s direction but doesn’t achieve much. The Watcher Stakes a Claim; the Shadow Effigy does likewise. The Nephilim Shackles my Effigy and Francisco in the hope of getting them into the right half of the board. The Brutal Effigy uses Fear Not The Sword on Perdita and hands the surviving Brother a Cursed Object since he’s inconveniently sitting with a 4″ melee range stopping me from dropping Claims. Perdita guns Misaki down to a single wound. The Hunter makes a break for the top of the board but is Airbursted once again back to the scrum by Sensei Yu. I score for Cursed Object and Graham scores Stake a Claim. Turn 4: I get initiative; Francisco finally remembers El Mayor and cuts Misaki to bits, chewing through her last Soulstones on the way. Yamaziko charges into Perdita but can’t make anything hit. My Effigy Curses Sensei Yu. The Hunter finally finds itself free to drop a Claim Marker. Shang hilariously charges the Nephilim and kills it, dying to Black Blood in the process. Perdita guns down the last Brother. I score a final point for Cursed Object and the Strategy is a draw. Turn 5: Perdita shoots Yamazkio down. Everything rushes around dropping scheme markers; neither of us can manage to get a Claim marker down so the Strategy is a draw again. Guild win 6 – 5 (3 for Cursed Object and 3 for Protect Territory for me; 2 for Stake a Claim and 3 for Protect Territory for Graham). A very fine, close game against a very fine and fun opponent. I was glad to win against a player of Graham’s skill, especially considering the basic errors I kept making (notably forgetting to do El Mayor repeatedly). My positioning and target priority was OK, and I had a spot of luck when I needed it.

Folks I play frequently: Pool A - The Uber Filthmongers of Doom: Dr Maria "Queen Beyond the Wall" Wieland Pool B - The Nearly Men (& Panzer): Connor Barker Pool C - Good, But Not Quite Good Enough: Joe Taylor Pool D - The Not Really Club: Gareth Henry Pool E - Must Try Harder: Alastair Crowe Wildcards - Stockholm Syndrome: Martin Månson I will find you and pay in person on Saturday morning.

I favour the Malifaux Child if I'm using a totem at all with Sonnia. In some games having the board control afforded by double Flame Walls can be a strong advantage. The Purifying Flame is quite a nice target beacon for Sonnia and Samael, but I generally find that Sonnia at least can get shots off where she needs them. OVerall I haven't found it helpful enough to play in events, but that is not to say that it has no place in the right crew.

I'm a bit surprised at how few comments you're getting on these videos from other forum goers; I really enjoyed this. The amount of time you take allows a lot of detail and I think that they would be a good introduction to the game. I think that you could just present the crews, strategy and scheme pool (and schemes taken) as text at the start and save a little bit of the panning about with the camera.

Math Mathonwy - You make a good point about the board control for a Killjoy bomb, but my concern is that I have to put Tara in harms way for a full turn before I can deliver it. There have felt like a few cases where that could be enough of an opportunity for a wily opponent to kill her; indeed I've lost Tara in turn 1 of a few games because I underestimated the counterpunch that could be delivered before I unleash Killjoy. I too thought that the terrain was pretty fine. If anything though, I thought that the terrain in game 1 was better as there was plenty of scatter terrain in the middle. It's not easy to tell in the other 2 games because of the big buildings blocking my photos but there were fairly big open areas in the middle of both tables. Thanks for your good wishes for the UK GT. I'm really looking forward to it. The field is pretty tough so I'm not expecting any terrific results; I'll be happy if I can end up at with least 4 wins over the weekend. Arash_Suri - You are correct that Pull The Void can't be used if there are no more friendly models to activate. I might have done it in error; if so my apologies to my opponents. If you're referring to turn 1 of game 3, the sequence went: 1. Tara becomes last to activate, so Eternal triggers and she gets Reactivate. 2. Tara unburies Killjoy with Faces in the Void. 3. There is now another friendly model to activate so Pull The Void can be used again. Reading back, I wrote it the other way round so I see where the confusion comes from (sometimes I take liberties with the writing to make it flow better). I'd be very interested to read about how you play Tara; I feel like I've barely touched the surface of what can be done with her. Thanks for your kind words. MagicGis - Thanks very much, I'm glad you enjoy them.

Nice reports. Your skills at Malifaux really seem to be coming along; you won two games and lost to a pair of very skilled opponents. I love the commentary in the photos.

Dave - thanks very much. I probably wouldn't have remembered to use Lost Instants anyway, but even if I had then the two Freikorpsmen were literally on opposite sides of the board so I could only have tied up one of them. Once I killed the first by accident, the Specialist was rather closer to the surviving Freikorpsman but I'm not sure that he was within ~13" considering the LOS-blocking train. It's definitely something I need to try to remember for future games though. I had remembered that you had mentioned travelling up to Aberdeen and doing much the same. It makes me wonder what their local gamers must think of Malifaux players elsewhere that we keep coming up and doling out heavy defeats. Math Mathonwy - thank you, as always, for your very kind words. Killjoy is a neat trick but I am not really sure that the Tara Bomb is necessarily the best way to play her. Certainly I worry about telegraphing my intentions when i set up for it. It is definitely a bit of a 'noob-hammer' kind of move; if you haven't seen it before, suddenly finding a Fast Killjoy rocketing through your deployment zone is pretty worrying. In the game against Liam I think that he will become a very good player when he ventures a bit further afield and plays against a wider variety of opponents. I got the impression that he went with the tactic that generally works for him locally (i.e. Lure things into a kill zone) and got a little rattled when I counter punched him. Hopefully he'll be able to make it down to some of the bigger events. The Nothing Beast vs Killjoy thing you pointed out is certainly a telling comparison! Killjoy is a bit more expensive that the Nothing Beast, and I did probably prioritise resources to Killjoy, but even so that is a very different tally. If I'd remembered to focus with the Nothing Beast it would have been rather different; moderate damage of 5 is not to be sniffed at (though Killjoy also does the same moderate damage I suppose). Nothing Beast does bring a bit of a different toolkit to the table too, with Incorporeal, bigger melee range and attacking willpower.

Great painting, and great skin colours on Von Schill's bald patch. I really like the effect with grey and blue.

Game 3: Outcasts (me) vs Outcasts (Kit) Strategy: Extraction Schemes Pool: Line in the Sand, Distract, Assassinate, Outflank, Deliver A Message Outcasts: Deliver A Message (announced), Distract Outcasts: Line in the Sand (announced), Assassinate Crews Outcasts: Tara (Knowledge of Eternity, Obliteration Symbiote), Nothing Beast (Void Shield), Void Wretch, Freikorpsman, Freikorps Librarian, Killjoy, Johan, Malifaux Child Outcasts: Von Schill (Survivalist, Oathkeeper, The Shirt Comes Off), Strongarm Suit, 2 Freikorpsmen, 2 Freikorps Trappers, Freikorps Librarian, Freikorps Specialist Playing this with Close deployment, I could easily have tooled my crew for Assassinate but decided to try a pair of schemes such that my VPs would not depend on even making a single attack. Of course, it is still me, so I was definitely planning on killing plenty of Kit’s crew, but it would be for strategic purposes rather than to score directly. With Tara’s mobility and bury/unbury options I felt that I would be able to deliver something somewhere to Von Schill to give him a Message. I was hoping to hold the centre strongly and kill whatever came to challenge me for it with the Nothing Beast, Tara and Johan, then use Killjoy to delay something from even reaching the Informant marker and spend the rest of my pieces to Distract Kit’s Outcasts and stop them removing it. Turn 1: Both Trappers shoot Johan. Poor Johan, he’s been killed or reduced to a single wound in turn 1 of all three games today. Tara makes the Nothing Beast Fast and moves up aggressively to the centre. It sees an opportunity to pin the Specialist way back in his own deployment zone so charges in for not a lot of effect. Von Schill charges Tara but can’t make much impact on her. Johan smites him back rather more usefully. The Child makes the Librarian Fast and she walks up to Von Schill and hands him a Message (probably an invitation to his own funeral). The Strongarm Suit comes up to the centre and puts down a scheme marker, followed closely by the Librarian. Tara Slows the Strongarm Suit, unburies Killjoy and makes him Fast. Killjoy charges the Librarian and kills first her then the Strongarm Suit. Meanwhile all the Freikorpsmen and the Void Wretch run toward each other on the flanks. Turn 2: Tara pulses Fast with Temporal Shift (picking Von Schill and most of my crew), then slows Von Schill twice. He discards Oathkeeper to get back to his normal number of AP, then beats Tara up a little. Kit’s Freikorpsmen move to the centreline and drop scheme markers, then my Void Wretch and Freikorpsman stroll up and Distract each. Killjoy kills Von Schill and walks toward the Trapper on the left. Both Trappers shoot him but there are a lot of wounds to go through. Johan hides from the Trapper on the right. Finally the Nothing Beast and Specialist continue to waft their weapons ineffectually at each other. I score Extraction and Distract. Turn 3: Tara Slows the Freikorpsman on the left and the nearby Trapper. It misses a shot on Tara before Killjoy rends it limb from limb. His Freikorpman on the right kills min. The Nothing Beast and Specialist flap at each other for a few more AP. The Void Wretch knocks his Freikorpsman down to a single wound, but I think it has 2 left and accidentally kill it off with Tara, denying me Distract. I’m not sure what I was trying to do there as I could just as easily killed my Void Wretch and there was no reason to get Tara to intervene there. The Librarian fails to hurt the Trapper in his nest, then the Child makes her Fast. I score for the Strategy. Turn 4: Tara gives the surviving Trapper Slow. The Nothing Beast Distracts the Specialist and is finally killed off in return. The Librarian triple walks round to the Freikorpsman to stop him from removing Distract. The Void Wretch removes the scheme marker on the left. Tara shoots at the Trapper and then races back to score the Strategy; I also get Distract. Turn 5: Tara pings the Trapper three times with Pull The Void to kill him. The Freikorpman kills the Librarian. Johan moves round to engage the Specialist (to prevent the removal of Distract) and is also killed for his trouble. I score again for Extraction and Distract; Outcasts win 10 – 0. Despite the result, I felt like Kit knew his way round this crew. He was just unprepared for the sheer damage that my crew put out at the end of turn 1 and start of turn 2. For me, I think that the biggest thing I need to try to remember is to focus with the Nothing Beast before attacking since moderate damage is just so much better than weak damage. It was quite interesting to play the last few turns feeding my pieces into Kit’s simply to keep the Distract condition out there; it is very contrary to the way I normally try to do things (i.e. just to kill them as soon as I can). Overall it was a really enjoyable day out, even if the games weren’t quite as challenging or the event as well attended as I might have hoped. The Aberdeen gamers were very friendly and welcoming and I’m definitely planning to attend other events that they run if I can. Looking back, I think that I probably shouldn’t have approached these games as hard as I did. The first game I didn’t know how good any of this group were so I went with my standard tournament approach of trying to do my very best. In the second game I should have backed off and played a master I’ve not used very often (probably Jack Daw), but the other locals seemed to regard Liam as pretty good at Malifaux and I didn’t want to disappoint him by not giving him a hard game. Finally against Kit, I again should have used a less familiar master, but by then I was thinking that since I had already won two games 10 – 0 it would be an interesting challenge to see if I could get a ‘perfect’ result. Hopefully I didn’t come across as arrogant, or spoil anyone’s day or gaming experience. The group as a whole seemed really receptive to learning new ways to do things in Malifaux and Kit in particular mentioned that he was going to go back to his own Tara crew (abandoned because he couldn’t work out how to use her) and play it again based on what he had seen in our game. As Furycat neatly put it on the way home: ‘I hope that they [the Aberdeen locals] weren’t too upset that we came up on the train and took their lunch money.’