Commentary on a top table with Reva.

[Maniacal_cackle]

One thing the Vassal Series is providing us is the opportunity to see some top quality games in action! One such game happened between Plaag and @Pergli. Pergli (PersonalGlitch in the video) was playing Reva, so I thought we could discuss the game from a Ressers perspective here.

This is Round 3 (public Enemies) of the March game.

You can see the video here, or just read the commentary below.

Right, I'll start with some of my thoughts. I'll do it turn by turn. I'm still watching the video, so you'll get my thoughts at the end of each turn.

The crew list:

I've said before that Reva feels like the most 'ranged' master in Ressers, and this game is an excellent example of that. Between Vincent, Anna, and Reva, the crew can dish out a LOT of damage without even engaging the enemy. But of course if melee combat happens, this crew is equally capable of dishing out the damage in melee. Very flexible crew!

The full crew is Reva & Candles, Vincent, Anna, Dead Rider, Draugr, Shieldbearer.

Turn 1:

Dead Rider is super aggressive, and moves quite far up the board. This exposes it to (unsuccessful) lures and parasite tokens. I was initially worried about this placement because it does expose the Dead Rider to unnecessary danger/potentially force it to cheat some cards. However, later in the turn there's a big payoff where shielded Dead Rider provides a way for Reva to attack a nest, removing it from the board turn one without any repercussions. Paid off extremely well!

I also notice his style with Shieldbearer is different from mine. Turn one, I usually activate a shieldbearer third (after the corpse candles) and do the focus pulse early and then spread out. He stayed clustered and did the focus pulse later in the turn. This gives the advantage of having the pyre markers further up the board (and thus a corpse candle further up the board). It has the downside of requiring clustering. Not sure which technique I prefer, but it is definitely an interesting difference! He also didn't use his shieldbearer to bash models up the field, which is quite different from how I usually run it. But I can imagine there wasn't much point in bashing most of the models (or perhaps he did not have a mask in hand and didn't think 2 inches was worth 1 damage, or the lost movement on the Shieldbearer).

Overall, the positioning end of turn one seems very solid. A pyre marker in the centre of the field and a corpse candle, then all his models are in a relatively safe position. Everything that was close to Dead Rider is now dead, and it is unactivated so it is no longer in big danger from lures. Reva is off super safe in the back, despite just having taken three attacks.

Really worth looking at the positioning end of turn one, here. A good example of how a ranged Reva crew can be effective while staying safe.

Turn 2:

Start of turn 2, there is the question of initiative after Pegli wins the flip. The battle hasn't started yet and both crews are quite far apart. Often in this position it can make sense to go second, giving you more activation control at the end of the turn.

However, with Reva there is always a chance you lose activation control by your corpse candles dying before they activate. I don't know if this is why Pergli does what he does, but he chooses to activate first and kills an unactivated Eyes and Ears, giving him the best of both worlds.

This is an interesting situation - killing a summoned 3 stone model is not the best use of an 11-cost model like Anna Lovelace, but at the same time the action doesn't seem intense enough that she has better things to do. She does also explode the model and draw a card, as well as get another corpse on the battlefield in the middle of the enemy crew, and gets a bit of activation control. So overall seems pretty useful, but I do wonder about the value. I believe she produces value later in the game, though, so will see!

Second activation, Pergli chooses to activate the corpse candle, denying Plaag the opportunity to get back some activation control by killing the unactivated candle. I wonder if this is a mistake on Plaag's part, or if he just didn't have anything capable of killing the corpse candle in an efficient way. But typically in my view, if you have an opportunity to kill a corpse candle to secure some activation control, it is good on these turns where activation control matters. Candle engages nest which is just the best possible use of candles when not using them as resources IMO. Engagement is pretty useful.

Vincent follows up with killing an unactivated nest, continuing with the relentless activation control.

Reva charges up quite early and kills an Eyes and Ears before it can turn into a Berserker Husk. Initially I assumed this is a bit of a mistake. First off, Husks can give points in public enemies, so that's not a big deal if it does upgrade. Second, Reva has worked really hard to get activation control here, and now is putting Reva into the line of fire in the middle of the turn. Perhaps I'm wrong, though, continuing to watch...

Shieldbearer activates and burns through their activation. Interestingly, she does not shieldbash Reva backwards here. Another opportunity to get Reva into a safer position (although again, maybe Pergli didn't have a low mask in hand).

At this point, Pergli starts burning pass tokens, a key part of capitalising on the activation advantage. Although again, I think that should have been done just a step earlier, allowing Reva to activate at the end of the turn as well. This would mean that Plaag would have no way to advance up the board without exposing himself to the danger of Reva beats (which is quite a significant threat when applied to a model like Meredith or Archivist!) I could be wrong, of course!

Archivist punishes Reva for the positioning, taking two stones out of Reva's pool to negate the damage. This is interesting to consider - Pergli did not get severely punished for how he positioned Reva here, but he did lose some resources. Two stones can be a big deal; I wonder how important those stones will be later.

Dead Rider runs in and does an EPIC summon of 5 mindless zombies. However, it primarily kills weak models and doesn't secure any points, and it costs Rider EDIT: 5 health!! On top of that, Rider is now in the danger zone. If it was me, I would have run along a flank and tried to set up a 14 inch reap the next turn (although not sure where the Emissary would end up placing, as reaping the emissary in a Reva crew is really hard). So maybe my idea wouldn't work out either.

It is an interesting turn. I feel like Pergli got a massive advantage early in the turn, but then didn't have the ability to capitalise on it (perhaps it just comes down to cadmus being OP xD).

Turn 3:

So Plaag gets to go first, and naturally punishes the Dead Rider, getting it down to 2. This is where the positioning of Dead Rider starts to hurt Pergli. He is forced to activate Reva and heal Rider for 6 and kill a few husks (getting two tokens). A solid activation for Reva, but now SHE is out of position, and only had to do this to save the Rider.

Next Plaag forces some duels to avoid getting parasites. Reva and Dead Rider are okay, but it costs TWO cards (basically disaster for a Reva crew). But worth noting at least Reva has killed two berserker husks at this point because Dead Rider softened them up last turn. So maybe it will turn out to have been worth it.

Archivist beats down Dead Rider back down to 1 health. So really punished him for starting the turn in the danger zone. Then proceeds to score Vendetta. So that's potentially game-breaking, scoring points AND getting Rider close to out of the fight.

Rider activates and flees, contributing nothing but denying public enemies + vendetta points at the end hopefully.

Anna does more destruction from far away. So does Vincent (mostly on insignificant models).

Draugr flies in to do some punching. It is end of the turn, so it won't be giving away tokens, but it gives Plaag a new target to hit at the start of next turn potentially... Will see how that turns out!

Ngaatoro manages to bypass some of the situation and charge Reva, dishing out punishment for the positioning. Reva stoned to nothing.

Overall, the turn is a clear example of how much damage the crew can do from far away, but was really punished from the Dead Rider being exposed to danger. Dead Rider being exposed to danger did tons of damage to him, and then ate cards + stones to keep Reva safe. Still, it was a good example of how to salvage a situation - the Dead Rider ended up living, and Reva came out of it healthy!

Turn 4:

Pending...

 

I am going to slowly fill out my thoughts as I watch the game, but feel free to comment and give your own views in the meantime!

[Plaag]

2 hours ago, Maniacal_cackle said:

One thing the Vassal Series is providing us is the opportunity to see some top quality games in action! One such game happened between Plaag and @Pergli. Pergli (PersonalGlitch in the video) was playing Reva, so I thought we could discuss the game from a Ressers perspective here.

This is Round 3 (public Enemies) of the March game.

You can see the video here, or just read the commentary below.

Right, I'll start with some of my thoughts. I'll do it turn by turn. I'm still watching the video, so you'll get my thoughts at the end of each turn.

The crew list:

I've said before that Reva feels like the most 'ranged' master in Ressers, and this game is an excellent example of that. Between Vincent, Anna, and Reva, the crew can dish out a LOT of damage without even engaging the enemy. But of course if melee combat happens, this crew is equally capable of dishing out the damage in melee. Very flexible crew!

The full crew is Reva & Candles, Vincent, Anna, Dead Rider, Draugr, Shieldbearer.

Turn 1:

Dead Rider is super aggressive, and moves quite far up the board. This exposes it to (unsuccessful) lures and parasite tokens. I was initially worried about this placement because it does expose the Dead Rider to unnecessary danger/potentially force it to cheat some cards. However, later in the turn there's a big payoff where shielded Dead Rider provides a way for Reva to attack a nest, removing it from the board turn one without any repercussions. Paid off extremely well!

I also notice his style with Shieldbearer is different from mine. Turn one, I usually activate a shieldbearer third (after the corpse candles) and do the focus pulse early and then spread out. He stayed clustered and did the focus pulse later in the turn. This gives the advantage of having the pyre markers further up the board (and thus a corpse candle further up the board). It has the downside of requiring clustering. Not sure which technique I prefer, but it is definitely an interesting difference! He also didn't use his shieldbearer to bash models up the field, which is quite different from how I usually run it. But I can imagine there wasn't much point in bashing most of the models (or perhaps he did not have a mask in hand and didn't think 2 inches was worth 1 damage, or the lost movement on the Shieldbearer).

Overall, the positioning end of turn one seems very solid. A pyre marker in the centre of the field and a corpse candle, then all his models are in a relatively safe position. Everything that was close to Dead Rider is now dead, and it is unactivated so it is no longer in big danger from lures. Reva is off super safe in the back, despite just having taken three attacks.

Really worth looking at the positioning end of turn one, here. A good example of how a ranged Reva crew can be effective while staying safe.

Turn 2:

Start of turn 2, there is the question of initiative after Pegli wins the flip. The battle hasn't started yet and both crews are quite far apart. Often in this position it can make sense to go second, giving you more activation control at the end of the turn.

However, with Reva there is always a chance you lose activation control by your corpse candles dying before they activate. I don't know if this is why Pergli does what he does, but he chooses to activate first and kills an unactivated Eyes and Ears, giving him the best of both worlds.

This is an interesting situation - killing a summoned 3 stone model is not the best use of an 11-cost model like Anna Lovelace, but at the same time the action doesn't seem intense enough that she has better things to do. She does also explode the model and draw a card, as well as get another corpse on the battlefield in the middle of the enemy crew, and gets a bit of activation control. So overall seems pretty useful, but I do wonder about the value. I believe she produces value later in the game, though, so will see!

Second activation, Pergli chooses to activate the corpse candle, denying Plaag the opportunity to get back some activation control by killing the unactivated candle. I wonder if this is a mistake on Plaag's part, or if he just didn't have anything capable of killing the corpse candle in an efficient way. But typically in my view, if you have an opportunity to kill a corpse candle to secure some activation control, it is good on these turns where activation control matters. Candle engages nest which is just the best possible use of candles when not using them as resources IMO. Engagement is pretty useful.

Vincent follows up with killing an unactivated nest, continuing with the relentless activation control.

Reva charges up quite early and kills an Eyes and Ears before it can turn into a Berserker Husk. Initially I assumed this is a bit of a mistake. First off, Husks can give points in public enemies, so that's not a big deal if it does upgrade. Second, Reva has worked really hard to get activation control here, and now is putting Reva into the line of fire in the middle of the turn. Perhaps I'm wrong, though, continuing to watch...

Shieldbearer activates and burns through their activation. Interestingly, she does not shieldbash Reva backwards here. Another opportunity to get Reva into a safer position (although again, maybe Pergli didn't have a low mask in hand).

At this point, Pergli starts burning pass tokens, a key part of capitalising on the activation advantage. Although again, I think that should have been done just a step earlier, allowing Reva to activate at the end of the turn as well. This would mean that Plaag would have no way to advance up the board without exposing himself to the danger of Reva beats (which is quite a significant threat when applied to a model like Meredith or Archivist!) I could be wrong, of course!

Archivist punishes Reva for the positioning, taking two stones out of Reva's pool to negate the damage. This is interesting to consider - Pergli did not get severely punished for how he positioned Reva here, but he did lose some resources. Two stones can be a big deal; I wonder how important those stones will be later.

Dead Rider runs in and does an EPIC summon of 5 mindless zombies. However, it primarily kills weak models and doesn't secure any points, and it costs Rider 1/3 of his life. On top of that, Rider is now in the danger zone. If it was me, I would have run along a flank and tried to set up a 14 inch reap the next turn (although not sure where the Emissary would end up placing, as reaping the emissary in a Reva crew is really hard). So maybe my idea wouldn't work out either.

It is an interesting turn. I feel like Pergli got a massive advantage early in the turn, but then didn't have the ability to capitalise on it (perhaps it just comes down to cadmus being OP xD).

Turn 3:

Pending...

 

I am going to slowly fill out my thoughts as I watch the game, but feel free to comment and give your own views in the meantime!

i played safety because reap trigger of dead rider is harder than colette presto chango and 1 turn i tried to lure rider, so if it was happen he would activate him early, but opp fliped well and i just waited; i had 13 in my hand to try to give parasite with nest, but it was killed with rj, so plan failed

[Maniacal_cackle]

19 minutes ago, Plaag said:

i played safety because reap trigger of dead rider is harder than colette presto chango and 1 turn i tried to lure rider, so if it was happen he would activate him early, but opp fliped well and i just waited; i had 13 in my hand to try to give parasite with nest, but it was killed with rj, so plan failed

You should know by now that if a Rider is involved, your opponent red jokers EVERY time 🤣

I red joker-ed your Mechanical Rider both games xD

[Pergli]

Nice so far, I will add a few thoughts.

Killing nests and eyes and ears is significant into cadmus and is always worth the action.

1. Removing activation control, thereby making your pass tokens stronger or be able to save them to counter archivist.

2. Stopping them from growing into husks, killing a df 3, 3 wound model with no htw is easier than a 7 wound def 4 model with htw.

3. Eyes and ears can lure models out of position and drag me into his bubble which he failed alot!

4. When eyes and ears die, they can give parasite tokens. This game, I worked really hard to not gain any parasite tokens and it worked out really well. Plaag would have run them in my face like he did I think t2, to make me kill them anyway but then force duels for parasites.

5. The core bubble of the crew is extremely hard to penetrate, especially in corner when they are so far away. I did not expect easy shots into his crew so I had to focus on taking out his insignificant support. 

6. When the EE engine is left to its own devices because you're focusing on trying to kill difficult models and failing, that is when you get overwhelmed by cadmus which then leads to being tabled. 

7. Cadmus will just pass wounds to them anyway and then heal them. Killing them takes them out of the global health pool.

8. I would rather kill them on my terms rather than let my opponent slowly bleed my dmg output through them and then force me to deal with them later

There is my strategic write up as to why killing EE is extremely important into cadmus. 

Edit - Sorry for typos and bad english, typed this up pretty quickly before going into work.

 

[Pergli]

Also, when you finish, I'll put my post game thoughts on what I should have done differently. There are 2-3 decisions that could have swung it my direction. If ppl want to know if course :).

[Maniacal_cackle]

7 hours ago, Pergli said:

Nice so far, I will add a few thoughts.

Killing nests and eyes and ears is significant into cadmus and is always worth the action.

1. Removing activation control, thereby making your pass tokens stronger or be able to save them to counter archivist.

2. Stopping them from growing into husks, killing a df 3, 3 wound model with no htw is easier than a 7 wound def 4 model with htw.

3. Eyes and ears can lure models out of position and drag me into his bubble which he failed alot!

4. When eyes and ears die, they can give parasite tokens. This game, I worked really hard to not gain any parasite tokens and it worked out really well. Plaag would have run them in my face like he did I think t2, to make me kill them anyway but then force duels for parasites.

5. The core bubble of the crew is extremely hard to penetrate, especially in corner when they are so far away. I did not expect easy shots into his crew so I had to focus on taking out his insignificant support. 

6. When the EE engine is left to its own devices because you're focusing on trying to kill difficult models and failing, that is when you get overwhelmed by cadmus which then leads to being tabled. 

7. Cadmus will just pass wounds to them anyway and then heal them. Killing them takes them out of the global health pool.

8. I would rather kill them on my terms rather than let my opponent slowly bleed my dmg output through them and then force me to deal with them later

There is my strategic write up as to why killing EE is extremely important into cadmus. 

Edit - Sorry for typos and bad english, typed this up pretty quickly before going into work.

 

Totally makes sense! I was super impressed by the first turn and a half.  It is the most efficient removal of both nests I've ever seen. A few questions!

1. Do you wish you had activated Reva later on turn 2, or was it the right call for the above reasons?

2. Do you think charging in the Dead Rider was worth it overall turn 2?

3. When is the appropriate time to swap from killing the insignificants to the main crew?

Thanks for all your thoughts!

[Pergli]

6 minutes ago, Maniacal_cackle said:

Totally makes sense! I was super impressed by the first turn and a half.  It is the most efficient removal of both nests I've ever seen. A few questions!

1. Do you wish you had activated Reva later on turn 2, or was it the right call for the above reasons?

2. Do you think charging in the Dead Rider was worth it overall turn 2?

3. When is the appropriate time to swap from killing the insignificants to the main crew?

Thanks for all your thoughts!

Thank you!

1. Not really. Maybe activating the Draugr to waste an activation but overall, I think it was the right play. I needed to apply pressure and the EE need to be removed against Cadmus. You could say they are "free" models but they are a very significant portion of what makes Cadmus a strong master. Otherwise, they wouldn't spend all of Nexus' activation moving models around and then summoning them. 

2. Yes, even though the rider ended up getting smacked around. I needed to apply pressure to my opponent and summoning the 5 zombies put a huge amount of it on Plaag. While they don't do ALOT, they are annoying chaff which requires my opponent to spend their AP and attention on dealing with which I can then resummon them as they die. Unfortunately T3, I didn't draw a crow so I had to evacuate the rider. 

3. That's all based on timing and availability. If I had the option to kill meredith or archivist rather than his nonsense models, I would have in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, they play so far back that in order to actually make a move on them, I would have to be overly exposed to the parasite bubble. You also have to factor in "Can you actually kill that model" while making your attacks. WAL, Take the Hit, shielded and their passive healing makes the crew very durable to the point that if you don't finish the job quickly, it will be like nothing happened. You can reference our Schtook vs Cadmus game to see that result. I opted instead to kill the weaker models that he needs to make his crew work.

The Eyes and Ears would just soak my damage anyway (as you'll see on T4, my first mistake) so you might as well remove them on your terms rather than letting the nexus player gleefully allocate wounds around.
 

[Maniacal_cackle]

3 minutes ago, Pergli said:

Thank you!

1. Not really. Maybe activating the Draugr to waste an activation but overall, I think it was the right play. I needed to apply pressure and the EE need to be removed against Cadmus. You could say they are "free" models but they are a very significant portion of what makes Cadmus a strong master. Otherwise, they wouldn't spend all of Nexus' activation moving models around and then summoning them. 

2. Yes, even though the rider ended up getting smacked around. I needed to apply pressure to my opponent and summoning the 5 zombies put a huge amount of it on Plaag. While they don't do ALOT, they are annoying chaff which requires my opponent to spend their AP and attention on dealing with which I can then resummon them as they die. Unfortunately T3, I didn't draw a crow so I had to evacuate the rider. 

3. That's all based on timing and availability. If I had the option to kill meredith or archivist rather than his nonsense models, I would have in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, they play so far back that in order to actually make a move on them, I would have to be overly exposed to the parasite bubble. You also have to factor in "Can you actually kill that model" while making your attacks. WAL, Take the Hit, shielded and their passive healing makes the crew very durable to the point that if you don't finish the job quickly, it will be like nothing happened. You can reference our Schtook vs Cadmus game to see that result. I opted instead to kill the weaker models that he needs to make his crew work.

The Eyes and Ears would just soak my damage anyway (as you'll see on T4, my first mistake) so you might as well remove them on your terms rather than letting the nexus player gleefully allocate wounds around.
 

Great insights, thanks!

All makes sense! After all, our Mindless Zombies are somewhat analgous to their Eyes and Ears, makes sense to bog down the game with them.

I did wonder if you could pull off a Reap turn 3 instead, but it looked like the placement of his Emissary turn 3 made that almost impossible.

[Pergli]

12 minutes ago, Maniacal_cackle said:

Great insights, thanks!

All makes sense! After all, our Mindless Zombies are somewhat analgous to their Eyes and Ears, makes sense to bog down the game with them.

I did wonder if you could pull off a Reap turn 3 instead, but it looked like the placement of his Emissary turn 3 made that almost impossible.

Yeah, that was my thought. MZ to counter the EE nonsense and I think it was fine. I'd try it again but better!

I may have been able to pull off a reap, honestly not sure. I wasn't trying to move him too close to my models. My hand presence wasn't comfortable so if he had a cadmus model too close to my crew it would have given Nexus an opening to start parasiting my models. If he wants to spend the AP running across the board to get within range, I can live with that but I didn't want to be the reason why he was next to me. 

I'll honestly take it as a win that he was only able to parasite 4 mindless zombies the entire game. 

[Maniacal_cackle]

Just now, Pergli said:

Yeah, that was my thought. MZ to counter the EE nonsense and I think it was fine. I'd try it again but better!

I may have been able to pull off a reap, honestly not sure. I wasn't trying to move him too close to my models. My hand presence wasn't comfortable so if he had a cadmus model too close to my crew it would have given Nexus an opening to start parasiting my models. If he wants to spend the AP running across the board to get within range, I can live with that but I didn't want to be the reason why he was next to me. 

I'll honestly take it as a win that he was only able to parasite 4 mindless zombies the entire game. 

Yeah, that was the most impressive parasite-avoidance of any game against Plaag that I've seen. Very good job!

For Reap, I was more thinking pulling a model out of the bubble to a flank (for instance, Ngaatoro pulled 14 inches north would create a 1v1 battle between rider and Ngaatoro). However, it worked out that his Emissary covered all the viable Reap targets, and Reaping Emissary is tricky when he is saving a few cards a turn (and turns out those were 13s).

[Pergli]

Probably but the rider vs Toro? Not a great match up. I'd have to focus and swing otherwise he will just spend cards to put rider on - flips. Snagging archivist or Meredith into a corner would have been good, up until he summons 3 EE who then just lure the model back into the bubble. I believe Kharnage tried the pulling models out of the bubble to isolate them but the lures are too good. 

[Maniacal_cackle]

Just now, Pergli said:

Probably but the rider vs Toro? Not a great match up. I'd have to focus and swing otherwise he will just spend cards to put rider on - flips. Snagging archivist or Meredith into a corner would have been good, up until he summons 3 EE who then just lure the model back into the bubble. I believe Kharnage tried the pulling models out of the bubble to isolate them but the lures are too good. 

Makes sense!

[Maniacal_cackle]

Bit of a tangent, but has anyone tried Manos into Nexus? That mobility + ranged attacks + pulse staggered seems really good in the matchup.

[Pergli]

Could be doable, I haven't tried it yet but its possible.

Ranged WP attack against a low WP crew that gives staggered (nests at mv1 sound hilarious), also can definitely slow the bubble down. Assassin can come into play here because killing unactivated models is the name of the game into Cadmus. Latern also means he doesn't have to worry about EE popping him for Df duels for parasite tokens.

Give it a go and report back

[Maniacal_cackle]

23 minutes ago, Pergli said:

Could be doable, I haven't tried it yet but its possible.

Ranged WP attack against a low WP crew that gives staggered (nests at mv1 sound hilarious), also can definitely slow the bubble down. Assassin can come into play here because killing unactivated models is the name of the game into Cadmus. Latern also means he doesn't have to worry about EE popping him for Df duels for parasite tokens.

Give it a go and report back

I hope to, just need to play against Nexus xD

[Adran]

20 hours ago, Pergli said:

Nice so far, I will add a few thoughts.

Killing nests and eyes and ears is significant into cadmus and is always worth the action.

1. Removing activation control, thereby making your pass tokens stronger or be able to save them to counter archivist.

2. Stopping them from growing into husks, killing a df 3, 3 wound model with no htw is easier than a 7 wound def 4 model with htw.

3. Eyes and ears can lure models out of position and drag me into his bubble which he failed alot!

4. When eyes and ears die, they can give parasite tokens. This game, I worked really hard to not gain any parasite tokens and it worked out really well. Plaag would have run them in my face like he did I think t2, to make me kill them anyway but then force duels for parasites.

5. The core bubble of the crew is extremely hard to penetrate, especially in corner when they are so far away. I did not expect easy shots into his crew so I had to focus on taking out his insignificant support. 

6. When the EE engine is left to its own devices because you're focusing on trying to kill difficult models and failing, that is when you get overwhelmed by cadmus which then leads to being tabled. 

7. Cadmus will just pass wounds to them anyway and then heal them. Killing them takes them out of the global health pool.

8. I would rather kill them on my terms rather than let my opponent slowly bleed my dmg output through them and then force me to deal with them later

There is my strategic write up as to why killing EE is extremely important into cadmus. 

Edit - Sorry for typos and bad english, typed this up pretty quickly before going into work.

 

Thanks for this insight, I like how you have looked at the problem with fresh eyes, I know I was stuck in some mental ruts and hadn't fully appreciated how something like aggressively removing eyes and ears can help disrupt the Cadmus list, because it goes against what feels sensible, not wasting action killing insignificant models that can just be summoned back. 

[Pergli]

On 3/23/2021 at 3:27 AM, Adran said:

Thanks for this insight, I like how you have looked at the problem with fresh eyes, I know I was stuck in some mental ruts and hadn't fully appreciated how something like aggressively removing eyes and ears can help disrupt the Cadmus list, because it goes against what feels sensible, not wasting action killing insignificant models that can just be summoned back. 

I agree 100% on this and I think I may have discovered this accidentally in one of my earlier games against some cadmus players. I noticed when they couldn't get the Eyes and Ears out either with Black Jokers or I was able to burn their hand and they had to get lucky flips or only summon a single one, the turn was MUCH easier to play through. These nonsense models are such a core part of the Cadmus strategy which is also why Cadmus players are perfectly happy burning Nexus' entire activation to summon as many as possible. 

Also, if your opponent brings a cryptologist or... TWO as i've seen, then killing the EE is much more important because you'll have 3 beserker husks being rammed down the field a turn if you don't have a plan to deal with them. 

I should probably write a tactica on these models and how much power they have because I could likely add another 10-20 points as to why Eyes and Ears are hinges to Nexus and need to be removed ASAP. I'll see about typing that up this weekend when I get more free time and can order my thoughts into something coherent.

[Pergli]

I'm unsure when Maniacal Cackle will get to T4 or T5 so I'll input the key mistakes I made which would have swung the game to me had I just made some slight alterations. If you're reading this, you should skip over this so you don't influence your own gameplay analysis!

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Up until T3, I think I made all the right calls and decisions. Maybe putting Rider at risk was a gamble but you need to take risks to win games especially against players as meticulous as Plaag. I have a local player who has a similar playstyle/mindset and i've realized the only way to win those games is to do things that throws as many wrenches in their planning as possible as well as letting fate take control.

T4 - I popped the unquiet dead on Reva which ended up healing some models but I don't see that as a mistake. Instead, I burned a nice chunk of high cards out of his deck which he would have used against me. This is what makes simple duels so powerful, if my opponent passes the duels, those cards aren't going to be used against me and if they fail then they either have to lose resources out of their hand or suffer consequences. It's always a win-win. It is unfortunate about the healing but it is what it is into Nexus.

The mistake comes into play when I ran rider back in. I probably could have kept him hidden and denied Vendetta as well as a PE point but I thought the risk was worth the reward. I figured whoever kills him, I can remove from the game to deny the PE point and I was going to try to kill the archivist so it would be a wash while applying pressure to my opponent.

Two things here: 1. Keep him hidden in a corner and play keep away which is uninteractive gameplay which I abhor... I'd rather see things happening than things hiding in corners even if it costs a game. Fun/interesting > Winning. With that being said, I made my target choice incorrectly. 2. The zombies should have swarmed the emissary and it would have collapsed. No WAL to save him, no healing (I think he would have healed once) and the poison/burning would have killed him to give me the PE point. He was only Df5 into Stat 6/7/8 mindless zombies with built in infect. With him out of the picture, I could have scored LYM on T5, PE on T5 and had more board control/actions available to me.  This decision literally cost me the game and I beat myself up about it for awhile afterwards. Plaag would have had a berserk husk from the EE that he shuffled wounds onto but I don't think it would have had too much of an impact with being out on T4 and Nexus already activated. Removing it would have been cake on T5.

Okay so now that T4 happened and I made bad target selection, T5 came down to some bad misplays.

1. I should have killed the Spell eater, not for what I mentioned in the video but because it was a easier PE point denial and it was unactivated. Only 5 wounds with 1 option for WAL means Reva on two weaks could have removed it and saved an AP for something else.

2. I don't remember if I had the card or not but if I did, I could have punched the emissary with my third AP (tough choice considering it was now Df 7 again) and did pulled here and there to move it off the middle ground so I could score LYM.

3. Yes, I realize I didn't heal the SB after Toro died, reviewing shows it didn't matter. The emissary just killed a MZ with it's second AP which Meredith would have killed anyway.

4. I think Vincent could have removed Nexus if Reva had killed the Spell Eater. May not have been able to but we could have seen what fate had in store for her. This would have given me another point for PE with the spell eater death. If nothing else, Anna could have also Disengaged and then put another shot into Nexus to try to remove her but that is a tall order with Stat 6 vs stat 7.

 

Overall, I'm happy with my list selection and how the game played out. The fact that I was able to give Cadmus a run for it's money while being played by such a skilled player and  with a master which is generally rated as weak (I am definitely not one of those, you can hear me talk about her love on Third Floor Wars) tells me that Cadmus IS beatable. While Cadmus may be slightly overturned (this is not the place to discuss that), I think this shows that there are definitely options when facing off vs Cadmus.  

[Paddywhack]

3 hours ago, Pergli said:

While Cadmus may be slightly overturned (this is not the place to discuss that), I think this shows that there are definitely options when facing off vs Cadmus.

I'm not sure two top players playing and you just managing to make his life hard and almost win means that Cadmus is OK.  

Still, nice to hear of a successful (sort of) tactic to take when facing them. I like Reva, but haven't been able to make her sing for me yet. She's still fun to play though. 

[Maniacal_cackle]

Very interesting insights into turns 4 and 5, and I'm sure far better than anything I'd have wrote! I'll try to watch it this weekend!

One thought I'm having about the previous discussion-

The problem with Cadmus is that Eyes and Ears are insignificant. I can see that on Symbols or Leylines, killing all those E&Es just shuts down the Cadmus engine so entirely. And of course killing the nests is hugely important.

However, one thing about letting E&Es upgrade in public enemies.- they give you free tokens when they're husks. Especially in a Cadmus crew, where it is super hard work to get your PE tokens anywhere else.

I'm not sure the right answer is to do something other than what you did (there might not be a right answer in this pool xD). If this pool had been Public Enemies with ways to score elsewhere on the table, it feels like you would have cleaned up just by making it a low scoring game and cleaning up the insignificant models.

But with the only scoring options in the centre, I do wonder if you overemphasised taking them down? I think the Rider play is especially interesting, as ultimately he gave up 3 points to your opponent. I know he helped earned points (at least 1, possibly 2), but it does seem like he gave away a lot of points. 

Of course, initially you can't know that he'll be giving up Vendetta points, so you can't make your decisions based on information you don't have.

[Maniacal_cackle]

I guess another key question is do you regret hiring the Rider? It is the only model that can't do damage from a distance, and its amazing Reap ability is much less effective against Plaags Cadmus.

I wonder if another "stay safe while doing damage" model may have worked well. Not sure what... Maybe Emissary for its focused gun or Bete Noire for vendetta shenanigans?

Emissary also seems sweet on that map for blocking off the centre and making life hard, or dropping coffins between his models to block LOS xD the anti heal aura is nice, but don't think you'd get to use it in that matchup.

EDIT: oh Draugr too.

That's 18 stones that maybe could have been used elsewhere?

[Pergli]

16 minutes ago, Maniacal_cackle said:

Very interesting insights into turns 4 and 5, and I'm sure far better than anything I'd have wrote! I'll try to watch it this weekend!

One thought I'm having about the previous discussion-

The problem with Cadmus is that Eyes and Ears are insignificant. I can see that on Symbols or Leylines, killing all those E&Es just shuts down the Cadmus engine so entirely. And of course killing the nests is hugely important.

However, one thing about letting E&Es upgrade in public enemies.- they give you free tokens when they're husks. Especially in a Cadmus crew, where it is super hard work to get your PE tokens anywhere else.

I'm not sure the right answer is to do something other than what you did (there might not be a right answer in this pool xD). If this pool had been Public Enemies with ways to score elsewhere on the table, it feels like you would have cleaned up just by making it a low scoring game and cleaning up the insignificant models.

But with the only scoring options in the centre, I do wonder if you overemphasised taking them down? I think the Rider play is especially interesting, as ultimately he gave up 3 points to your opponent. I know he helped earned points (at least 1, possibly 2), but it does seem like he gave away a lot of points. 

Of course, initially you can't know that he'll be giving up Vendetta points, so you can't make your decisions based on information you don't have.

I am unsure if I can give a good point on that topic as I don't have enough data with Cadmus into PE. I don't think I was very far behind in terms of points for public enemies. He did get Husks on T1 and T2 which gave me the PE point on T3. I got PE on T4 from Toro. I don't know if letting him have an extra husk or two to try to go for the third point would have been valuable enough to risk him having husks on the board. Their Swam or mites ability is crazy and it gives nexus more angles to attack through which then gives out parasite tokens. He was also saving Meredith's activations for late turn which would have had the husks pop late turn and been able to do some damage to me. Finally, I think Plaag is a good enough player that he would not have let me have husks for points easily.

My thinking during the game was: Meredith goes, summons a husk, heals to 6 wounds, passes a free heal to it to 7 wounds, throws a vial and succeeds by +2 and gets it to full health. Instead of a Df 3, 3 wound model with no HtW, I now have a Df 4, 8 wound model with HtW AND pushes at me everytime I attack it while also having strong damage output. I'd rather just put the model in the ground before it causes a problem and work on the other models. 

I agree that there may not be a right answer to this and Cadmus is terrifying in Public Enemies and Recover Evidence but they were much less intimidating when they didn't have those extra bodies.

--------------------------------------------------------------

I wasn't sure he would give up the 1st point but I was pretty sure he was going to give up the Vendetta and PE point. I took a gamble and it failed but its all about trying out strategies and learning from them. The likelihood that I'll run into Plaag's Cadmus during the master's event is pretty high so I'd rather take my gambles and do all my testing now before we get there :). 

---------------------------------------------------------------

No regrets on hiring the Rider or even the Draugr which I know is weird when seeing the gameplay.

The Rider hire had two impacts:

- The threat of reap is strong into Cadmus. Being able to yank something out of the bubble to get killed is extremely threatening which forces Cadmus to play more bubbled up as well as much more cautiously than normal. Sure the EE can lure the model back to safety but if there are no living EE on the table or they haven't popped out yet, the threat of it is imposing.

- I mostly wanted to test the effectiveness of the zombie spam. My question was, does bringing out 5 zombies a turn with Stat 6+ attacks 1/1/3 and built in infect who activate immediately have a strong impact. The answer was yes, as long as your targeting is good. T2 zombie summons was good at putting pressure on the husks and forcing Plaag to waste AP to deal with them. The T4 zombie summons wasn't effective and that was due to target priority.

The Draugr hire was intended to be counter play. I never intended for him to dive into Cadmus bubble but more focus on pushing Cadmus back and away from my core crew. Unfortunately, Plaag wasn't able to really get into my crew and I kept failing my teleports so it didn't do much. I still feel like I made the right choice and can't think of something that would have been a better hire for the 7 stones (I was already stone light at 4 stones). MAYBE bring a mourner for the ranged vs wp option but i'm not sold on them!

---------------------------------------------------------------------

I considered the Emissary but I play very Pyre Marker heavy so the coffin markers would have been difficult to place effectively when i'm being aggressive with killing models and dropping pyre/corpse. Also, EE can very easily waste insignificant actions to destroy the coffin markers. It could have been useful with a range 3/3/4 and blasts while giving poison and injured. It's on my list of things to see how it plays out.

[Maniacal_cackle]

Cheers for the insights!