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Stumbling through the Plague and Land Mines


TheJoyInGaming

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ANNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNND I AM BACK! College and life can turn out to be a real time sink...

For those that love accurate BatReps, a forewarning: I am doing this all from memory so I will be describing what happened each Turn though it may not necessarily be in order. For those that hate scrolling, here is the encounter my Wife and I played:

 

The Scenario

Turf War- Wedge Deployment

Dig Their Graves

Assassinate

Deliver a Message

Breakthrough

Power Ritual

 

My Crew- Skittering Wretch 
Size: 50 - Pool: 5
Leader:
  Hamelin
Totem(s):
  Stolen
  Stolen 2
  Stolen 3
Hires:
  Nix
  Obedient Wretch
  Freikorps Librarian
  Rat King
    Servant of Dark Powers
  Rat King 2
    Servant of Dark Powers
  Prospector
 

The Wife's Crew- Ten Thunders Parade 
Size: 50 - Pool: 6
Leader:
  Mei Feng
Totem(s):
  Forgeling
Hires:
  Shadow Emissary
  Dawn Serpent
  Sparks LeBlanc
    Trained Ninja
  Survivor
  Metal Gamin
  Metal Gamin 2

 

I chose Assassinate and Dig while my Wife decided to be cute(r) and chose Assassinate and Deliver a Message. I deployed my crew towards the Wedge point in a large bubble sans my 2 Rat Kings. Rat King 1 deployed forward a wee bit to act as bait whilst Rat King 2 was B2B with the left Turf War Marker. My Wife deployed her dragons around Sparks and her Survivor at her Wedge point. 

Turn 1

My Wife goes first and with her first activation her Survivor guns down Rat King 1 with 3 shots and a double severe on negatives. 2 Stolen re-position, and Concentrate, while she lays down her railroad with a Gamin. Mei Feng railwalks to the middle of a pond on my table half, blows up a Stolen, and Vent Steams. Nix is a good boy and charges her for some small damage and Blight. Dawn Serpent tries to back her up by walk charging Nix. I make a very big mistake with Hamelin next. I have Hamelin Lure Mei Feng towards him and he ends up in Vent Steam on resolution. I then use his:ToS-Fast:to have some Rats chew on the Dawn Serpent and then use Pestilent Tumors to chain explode them onto Mei Feng and the DS. I then Bleeding Disease the Serpent to drop him to HTK. All of these actions were within Vent Steam so I took a lot of damage and we both realized after the fact that I should have been on:-flipbecause Tumors targets my Rats. Too much has happened to walk back his Activation so we agree to have me lose a Stone for each action as If I had spend them to be on a Straight flip. I now have no Stones...

Sparks packs the Emissary with Explosives and my Obedient Wretch finishes off the Dawn Serpent. The Emissary goes into the scrum with Nix. The Rat King is finally brave enough to flip the left Turf War Marker and walks. My Wife's second Gamin moves to the Center and my Librarian heals Hamelin for 4 and uses her:ToS-Fast:to move my un-activated Stolen towards my Rat King. My last Stolen gives him some Cheese for Fast with the trigger to push him forward and go B2B. Prospector and Forgeling do... something (I honestly cannot remember).

Turn 2

I win Initiative and Nix goes first. He pulses Blight, putting Mei Feng at 6 total. He succeeds with Bleeding Disease twice, though between Armor and Stones she only takes 4 damage instead of 12. This is still enough to drop her to below half. Mei Feng Railwalks back to her left quadrant and flips a Turf War Marker. Dawn Serpent bites Nix and the Rat (left from the Dawn Serpent dieing) charges him in response. Forgeling tries to kill my Stolen near the Rat King and hilariously fails. The Prospector "lures" him over twice. Sparks flips my Wife's right Marker. Hamelin uses his whole activation to Lure the Forgeling over to a Scheme Marker and kills him. The Librarian re-positions with her :ToS-Fast:and Siphons a Rat, which she attacks, and draws 2 cards. Survivor and a Gamin do inconsequential things. The Rat King gets over to Sparks and attacks him, dealing 4 total damage. He ends up B2B with the Turf War Marker and engaged by Sparks as Sparks Scampered away. My Wife's second Gamin railwalks to Hamelin and Delivers a Message. The Obedient Wretch double walks towards my left Marker. One Stolen hides and the other makes my Rat King fast again.

Score: 3-2

Turn 3

I win Initiative and the Rat King activates. He walks, and attacks and kills Sparks. This flips the Marker Neutral, and he uses his last action to flip it to my side. the Emissary flails at Nix but doesn't kill him. The Librarian re-positions with her :ToS-Fast:and drops a Scheme Marker near a Corpse Marker for Dig. The Survivor does nothing consequential and my Prospector Appraises some Scrap. My Wife concedes. 

I likely would have scored the remainder of both Assassinate and Dig and a 3rd point for Turf War. My Wife may have earned 1 more point for Turf War so the ending score was 7-3. 

Takeaways

I felt very bad for my Wife during this game. Aside from her first Activation, she had no luck with her hands whilst I had amazing luck. She drew maybe 1 high card each Turn whilst my starting hand often contained at least 3. The cards I drew off of Rat deaths and the Librarian were also high cards so that only exacerbated things.

Some key errors also contributed to my victory. Whilst Dawn Serpent was annoying, he had almost no impact on the game. We talked after and I feel like she should have waited to send him in until after Sparks packed him with explosives. It would not have triggered any Blasts from my attacks, but it would have made me pay with the Demise Ability. Nix charging Mei Feng put her on kilter and she forgot she had Pass Tokens to use on Turn 1 which allowed me to have a good Activation advantage. The Pass Tokens weren't even enough to get her the Initiative for the following Turn (poor flips too). I have no idea how much my error contributed to her losing but I will say that Soulstone use is declared before flipping instead of after for a reason. My Wife took it all in good stride despite the error, but I do still feel bad about it.

My List performed as expected. I really like the Rat King, and the more I use him the more I realize how flexible of a model he is. He is such a good bully, especially with SoDP, that he can fight in a scrum or counter scheme as needed. Stolen proved amazing as always, though this is the first time I saved cards specifically for the Moldy Cheese trigger. The extra movement and place were great for allowing the Stolen to continue to buff the Rat King. This game only cemented for me the Wretch's role, and boy does she earn back her cost just by being there. She is a niche, but powerful, model that I never regret bringing when Vendetta or Assassinate are in the pool. The Prospector performed well. He wasn't flashy, but at "3" stones he definitely earned back his points in VP. Hamelin didn't actually do anything flashy this game, though he did aid in the demise of Dawn Serpent and the Forgeling, and helped stack Mei Feng to 8 Blight by Turn 3. Nix reminded me of Reva from the Ressers with his yoyoing health and good damage output on Blighted models, though this is bittersweet as I have even less reason to put her on the table now.

The Librarian made a lasting impression from this game for me. Most of the time when I evaluate models I try to temper my expectations as it is easy to only look at the best case scenario for them, but with how well she did, and with only supporting my Crew at that, it is hard not to imagine seeing this performance from her with every game. Her healing, card draw, and movement shenanigans help push Hamelin's attrition into overdrive, whilst her blast damage helps provide another source of non-direct damage. I am very excited to try her again in the future.

Well readers, that ends my thoughts from this game. I hope you enjoyed and that my terribly writing helps in some way. Gaps between posts will likely grow larger as I get further into my school work and the holiday season. I will try to post the scenario for my next game but I cannot make promises. I can say that it is Hamelin vs Sandeep in Corrupted Idols. 

Shalom!

Edited by TheJoyInGaming
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Hi everyone!

I decided to do a "half-post" today so I will be just posting the November Scenario to come and my Crew along with some initial thoughts. So let's get to it!

 

The Scenario

Corrupted Idols- Standard Deployment

Search the Ruins

Harness the Leyline

Deliver a Message

Detonate Charges

Power Ritual

 

My Crew- Skittering Vermin 
Size: 50 - Pool: 6
Leader:
  Hamelin
Totems:
  Stolen
  Stolen 2
  Stolen 3
Hires:
  Nix
  Freikorps Librarian
    Wanted Criminal
  Rat King
    Servant of Dark Powers
  Rat King 2
    Servant of Dark Powers
  Prospector
  Malifaux Rat
 

You will notice that my Crew choices for this game are much the same as last game. The Crew did so well on my last outing I wanted to try it a second time, though without Assassinate or Vendetta in the pool I felt that my points were better spent on the Wanted Criminal upgrade for the Librarian and a starting Rat rather than the Obedient Wretch. I briefly considered hiring a Winged Plague or another Prospector instead of a Rat and an Upgrade, but the former dies too easily to matter and I had doubts about the latter actually contributing anything to VP.

My Rat Kings are intended to be my objective runners whilst Hamelin and Nix run into the enemy and Blight them to death. Hamelin's Stolen and the Librarian will support them as needed and my Prospector will busy himself Appraising any Scheme Markers dropped for Search, Harness, Detonate, or Deliver. My lone Rat is there just in case he is needed, though he does provide a potentially useful denial application for Corrupted Idols.

Per our understanding of the Rules, an Idol can be denied placement if at least two things lie where it will be placed in such a way as to deny the Idol from being placed evenly on the Centerline touching both. To put simply, if two Rats are standing .9" away from each other, and both are located where the Idol will be dropped, the Idol cannot be placed as choosing one Rat to place next to will leave the other unchosen which will consequently disallow the Idol from being placed. This means I can deny a location of being a valid target for Idol placement Turn 2 by giving my Rat Moldy Cheese from a Stolen with the :masktrigger on Turn 1. This will allow the Stolen to push the Rat 6" and then place in front of it. The Stolen can then walk and use Inevitable Fate to summon 2 more Rats. Assuming your Rat was at the edge of Standard Deployment for this means your Stolen will be a little more than 19" up from the Table edge (8" Deployment + 7" Moldy Cheese Place + 4" Walk) before you even summon the 2 Rats to block an Idol area so there is some wiggle room to account for Deployment and any Severe Terrain.

I think this type of denial play style is key to playing Hamelin into Idols as blocking Idols from dropping means that I do not have to worry as much about Pass Tokens giving my Opponent an advantage. Any Idols that do end up dropping Nix can hopefully deny with his Loose Bowels, though doing so will paint a large target on his head. Due to this game plan I intend to rush the first Idol as VP from the Strategy will be rare if my plan works. This also means the bulk of my VP will be generated from Schemes. Search the Ruins and Detonate the Charges appear to be my best bet here, though Harness the Leyline could work. Power Ritual is too far removed from the Idols to try to complete, and I think Hamelin is bad at that scheme anyways. Deliver requires little Action investment on paper, but I know Sandeep likes to be far away so I am unsure of how viable of an option it actually is. 

I don't know Sandeep's crew well at all, but it seems likely that he will choose Power Ritual as he can summon models to complete it and my Wife knows that I never try that scheme with Hamelin. If she does choose it she will likely score both VP as it is unlikely that a Rat King can catch all of her run away summons. Her other likely choice is Search because... well... its Search. Who doesn't like free VP? Hopefully my Prospector can at least slow down this scheme...

Well that is my "half-post". Don't know when I will be able to post here again but hope you readers enjoyed.

Shalom!

Edited by TheJoyInGaming
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Change of plans readers! Our game has been pushed to the weekend of 11/2 so I am quickly typing this up so I can be free!!! Not that I mind typing these up, but I find myself very busy at the moment and having this done does help with life and stuff.

Also, as my Wife and I are very casual players, we break the rules when we want. Why does this matter? Because something occurred to me that peaked my interest more than even Hamelin... Meet my new crew for this encounter...

My Crew- Vontresor 
Size: 50 - Pool: 5
Leader:
  Von Schill
Totem(s):
  Steam Trunk
Hires:
  Montresor
    Servant of Dark Powers
  Hans
  Freikorps Librarian
    Wanted Criminal
  Freikorps Engineer
  Freikorpsmann
  Freikorpsmann 2
 

...Vontresor! (or maybe Von Stagger? I am still working on the name...) 

I did get my Wife's permission first since I had already declared Hamelin and I spiced it up by stating I would tell her 1 scheme at the beginning of the game. Again, I know this is breaking the rules but I already knew she was playing Sandeep from awhile ago anyways, and this is the type of jank I love to build. Now on to the list!

This list is built entirely around Montresor and his ability named Hanging Ropes. For those unfamiliar, Hanging Ropes is a 6":aurathat reads that the Staggered Condition cannot end on enemy models. This means that Staggered becomes a much more substantial debuff around Montresor which happens to be very useful for any Freikorps that happen to be packing Grenades. This turns Von Schill's grenades into a much more substantial hand drain and/or makes it more reliably do damage to enemy models. The grenades can also serve to provide debuffs through Distracted which will help Montresor stay on his feet. Montresor's synergy with the crew doesn't stop there though. His :rangedToss the Noose applies Staggered in the damage text meaning that it pairs very nicely with Von Schill's Pull trigger.

Hans is included to provide more Staggered around Montresor and to catch any Gamin that happen to sprint to my side of the board. Von Schill is meant to be up there with Montresor and will be tossing enemies to and fro to prevent them from leaving Montresor's bubble. The Librarian and Engineer will provide backup whilst my Freikorpsmann will be my objective runners. 

I am very excited to try this list out as my love for Vontresor goes back to Book 5 Von Schill and the shenanigans I would pull with this duo!

Hope you readers have some great games of Malifaux!

Edit: To clarify for readers, this list is the one I will be using for the upcoming scenario below:

The Scenario

Corrupted Idols- Standard Deployment

Search the Ruins

Harness the Leyline

Deliver a Message

Detonate Charges

Power Ritual

 

Is it optimized for this? Probably not. But I am sure that when Von Schill triggers Pull and throws Sandeep into a Land Mine which is then followed up with Montresor Tossing him a Noose to Stagger him I will be having too much fun to care.

Edited by TheJoyInGaming
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Brief update as my immune system has failed me and I got sick. My list for the next game underwent a few changes when I thought more critically about my game plan. Behold the power of Arik Vontresor below!

My Crew- Arik Vontresor 
Size: 50 - Pool: 6
Leader:
  Von Schill
    Servant of Dark Powers
Totem(s):
  Steam Trunk
Hires:
  Arik Schöttemer
  The Hanging Tree
    Servant of Dark Powers
  Hans
  Freikorps Engineer
  Prospector

This list seems much better for what I want to accomplish. Arik synergizes so exceptionally with my Montresor-Shockwave game plan that I couldn’t leave him home. His Aetheric Grenade is a regular action and has the same TN as the grenade belt, but with his :ToS-Fast:I don׳t need to choose between damage and Distracted for my enemy like I would have to if a minion were using the grenade belt. His :ToS-Fast:also increases the value of his already larger Shockwaves to a staggering 3, whilst his grenade already forces a more difficult MV duel of 13 instead of 12. The icing on the cake is that his :ToS-Fast:last until the end of the Turn, meaning that if I wasn’t done having fun with Shockwaves Von Schill can have Arik toss more grenades which would retain all of Arik’s perks.

Of course something had to be sacrificed for the mighty Arik which means my Freikorpsmann are on leave. Von Schill will be doing my scheming for Idols instead as I realized he is basically a premiere Freikorpsmann anyways. He is faster with a Mv of 6, much healthier with a health stat of 12, and has Diving Charge so no one can stop him from interacting after leaving engagement. SoDP was attached for the extra walk so that Von Schill can toss an Idol Turn 1 after tossing out upgrades to his team. Should Von Schill randomly kill an enemy, the combination of Survivalist and Unnatural Vigor will heal him 3, which I think is actually pretty good.

My Prospector will counter scheme and scheme on the center line. My Engineer will support Arik and Von Schill as needed. My Librarian will sit at home, which really hurts. I was struggling with deciding between the Librarian and the Engineer for a long time, but I think the Engineer wins out for this list because my main heal targets are Von Schill and Arik. Montresor I hope has enough healing with SoDP.

I am unsure if there will be a post on my Wife׳s selected crew as me being sick shortens my almost non-existent free time. Have a great day readers!

Shalom

Edited by TheJoyInGaming
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14 minutes ago, Zebo said:

Don't forget that Drachen Trooper also likes to shoot staggered enemies, since his Flamethrower also targets movement.

.... I should tell my friend to add one to Tormented crew!

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15 minutes ago, Zebo said:

Don't forget that Drachen Trooper also likes to shoot staggered enemies, since his Flamethrower also targets movement.

I heavily considered him as he is excellent for that synergy. Unfortunately, I will be playing vs Sandeep so my Wife can just summon in Fire Gamin and benefit from the flames.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi all. I am back with my report on how terribly my game went against my Wife!

For those with terrible memories, or a disdain for looking at previous posts, the scenario is below:

 

The Scenario

Corrupted Idols- Standard Deployment

Search the Ruins

Harness the Leyline

Deliver a Message

Detonate Charges

Power Ritual

 

My Crew- Arik Vontresor 
Size: 50 - Pool: 6
Leader:
  Von Schill
    Servant of Dark Powers
Totem(s):
  Steam Trunk
Hires:
  Arik Schöttemer
  The Hanging Tree
    Servant of Dark Powers
  Hans
  Freikorps Engineer
  Prospector

 

My Wife’s Crew- Djinn 
Size: 50 - Pool: 8
Leader:
  Sandeep Desai
Totem(s):
  Banasuva
Hires:
  Kudra
  Steam Arachnid Swarm
    Diesel Engine
  Silent One
    Magical Training
  Oxfordian Mage
  Ice Gamin
  Ice Gamin 2

 

To begin the summary with a bunch of excuses, my children decided to get sick before our game. This meant that we were juggling caring for them when we were deploying our models and that led to perhaps my worst performance of Malifaux ever. I was the Attacker, so I decided to give my Wife the Deployment Zone that had the abundance of Severe Terrain, whereas my Deployment was obstructed by a rather large Impassable, Blocking Boulder. I very unwisely decided to deploy Montresor and Arik together on the left side of the boulder and Von Schill and Hans on the other. Due to this, Montresor and Hans contributed very little to the actual game so that was 20 Stones down the drain already.

Game Summary

With Montresor and Hans neutered due to my stupidity, the game basically came down to Scheme-Runner-Schill v. Wind Gamin. I was quite surprised by the effectiveness of S.R. Schill as his combination of Diving Charge, Mv 6, and the Pull Trigger enabled him to Scheme with abandon. I really enjoyed having SoDP on him as this allowed me the freedom to give out more Equipment without wasting a Turn catching up, and a chance to Heal 3(!) on a kill. The Wind Gamin were unstoppable and did what they wanted for the most part due to a combination of a timely Black Joker for damage on Schill's rifle and an Ice Golem in my Deployment. 

Nothing much of consequence happened during the game. Arik killed a slightly wounded Swarm with a Red Joker for damage and the Engineer killed the Ice Golem due to consecutive Activations with the Armor Ignoring Trigger. Hans missed all of his shots and all of Montresor's plink damage was either ignored by Shielding, healed up by Concentrating around the Mage, or was not impactful because Staggered does not stop the model affected from Leaping away if it is a stupid Wind Gamin. I'm not salty about that though...

We called it in the middle of Turn 3 due to exhaustion (see caring for sick kids above). Despite the poor performances it was a hilarious game to play. My Wife gets weird when she gets really tired and was trying to be mystical whenever it was Sandeep's Activation. Think scrunchy face and arm wavings around like she is concentrating whilst summoning something.

Takeaways

I do not know if Montresor has a place in the Freikorps this edition as the odds were kind of stacked against him this game due to my poor Deployment and Sandeep's crew not caring. I do want to try it again in the future though. I know I will probably be using S.R. Schill again in the future though he will likely take some Freikorpsmann with him as well in case he needs to back up the main brawl that will inevitably happen.

So what does the future hold now? I have finals, the holidays, a plethora of birthdays, and hopefully some time for rest coming up so I likely will not be able to play Malifaux again until January. When I do I will post the results here though. I do have some ideas brewing though like a Hannah Burning list I want to tinker with. I also want to explore whether a Librarian or the Emissary is best with Hamelin (I think they serve different healing roles so it probably depends). This is largely due to me having bought a second Emissary to convert it to carrying bags of confections instead of weapons to go in line with my soon to be Hamelin and the Chocolate Factory crew. @psychogeek also said that he doesn't bring much to them so I kinda want him to be wrong (nothing personal lol). I am thinking maybe he can charge Nix Turn 1 to be up about 8" and start throwing junk around.

Anyways, have fun Malifauxing!

Shalom!

Edited by TheJoyInGaming
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6 hours ago, psychogeek said:

Well it’s more I don’t get much for his cost vs other things :p but that may just be me

I plan on alternating between these two lists when I return:

A Burro Of Vermin 
Size: 50 - Pool: 5
Leader:
  Hamelin
    Servant of Dark Powers
Totem(s):
  Stolen
  Stolen 2
  Stolen 3
Hires:
  Nix
  Hodgepodge Emissary
  Rat King
    Servant of Dark Powers
  Rat Catcher
    Soldier for Hire
  Winged Plague
  Winged Plague 2

A Wretched Burro 
Size: 50 - Pool: 5
Leader:
  Hamelin
    Servant of Dark Powers
Totem(s):
  Stolen
  Stolen 2
  Stolen 3
Hires:
  Nix
  Hodgepodge Emissary
  Obedient Wretch
  Rat King
    Servant of Dark Powers
  Rat King 2
  Winged Plague

 

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And for those interested in my Burning Hannah list:
 

Love, Lace, And Fire 
Size: 50 - Pool: 8
Leader:
  Von Schill
    Servant of Dark Powers
Totem(s):
  Steam Trunk
Hires:
  Hannah Lovelace
  Drachen Trooper
  Drachen Trooper 2
  Freikorps Librarian
    Wanted Criminal
  Freikorpsmann
 

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So I thought of some jank I will be play testing when I get back. Feedback on how to optimize it will be appreciated. I was so excited that I bought Benny on a whim for this...

I plan to use him in conjunction with 2x Wanted Criminal on my Stolen. No, that is not a typo. I find the idea of getting 3 cards off of Woozy Rat hilarious, and I think the Stolen will benefit from Swagger. The melee will be funny if it comes up.

Benny seems best as a counter-schemer as his actual AP seems to be best spent removing enemy Markers with Loyal Rats and walking.

Edited by TheJoyInGaming
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