Pandora vs the Viktorias

[hannibal]

Kealios and I played a Scrap last night. He took Pandora, Baby Kade, Candy, 2 Sorrows, and Teddy plus like 8 soulstones. I had the Viktorias, Hans, Taelor, and Bishop plus 4 soulstones.

We played in a Gremlin village with a deadzone right in the center of the board. We both got Slaughter for our strategy. For our schemes her chose Hold Out and Stake a Claim (choosing the dead zone). I chose . . . Hold Out and Thwart. So basically there was gonna be no trickery here, this was gonna be just a "heads down and charge" game.

Hans took position on a small hill which gave him a nice view for the game while Taelor advanced to my left. Opposite Taelor came Teddy. On my right went the Viktorias, Bishop vs the rest of his crew.

I focused on the Sorrows first and then the little freaking kids, figuring Pandora would be suicide if I went after her with all that support. Hans ended up killing the Sorrow attached to Candy and then Bishop charged Candy. I'd intended to knock her aside and then do a suicide rush on the other Sorrow at the rear of the Neverborn crew. Wasn't to be, so I just "tossed" Candy towards my line and then charged her again.

Turned out to be a bad idea as Candy proceeded to give Bishop sours and do other bad stuff to him. I was forced to move up and use both the Viktorias to finish her off.

On the left, Hans, Taelor, and Teddy danced for the whole game. When teddy was in the open, Hans would shoot. Teddy would hide in melee by attacking Taelor. But Taelor would knock Teddy away so Hans could shoot. This knockback ended up pushing Teddy into the deadzone so that Teddy was unable to cast spells for most of the game.

On the right(now center), there was all purpose pain between the Sorrow, Kade, Bishop, and the Viktorias. Bishop charged the sorrow but failed to kill him. Kade lured him away and did some damage, bringing Bishop down to 1 wound. Then a Viktoria, with twin masamunes, charged in and a whirlwind later the Sorrow was no more and Baby Kade was wounded. The Sorrow, before he died used Doldrums to pin down one of the Viktorias.

Throughout this Pandora used her spells to muddy up my plans, such as Incite to force Bishop to charge out (earlier), then project emotion on the general melee. Basically she was casting spells not so much for the effect but so that I'd fail willpower duels and take wounds. It worked very well with Bishop dying and putting pistol Viktoria t 3 wounds left and paired masamune viktoria to 5 wounds left.

In the critical last two turns of the game, I won initiative flips. On the left, Taelor and Hans finished off Teddy. But the action was in the center. The Viktorias activated. Twin masamune Viktoria killed Baby Kade and then walked twice into melee range with Viktoria (we determined that since I wasn't actually targeting Pandora with an attack, Expose Fears didn't come into play). Then pistol Viktoria moved in and attacked, putting 3 wounds on Pandora. Pandora used some spells, whittling away the ladies and I was forced to burn soulstones and cards like crazy.

The next turn was the climax. Viktorias go first. Pistol Viktoria cast Sisters in Battle and I selected Unfailing. I then proceed to miss fail the next 5 WP duels to hurt Pandora (taking a wound every time). On the fifth one I burned my last soulstone to succeed on the willpower roll. With paired masamune I was flipping 3 cards.

Top card: red joker. Huzzah! Plus 1 flip on the damage: a 1 and a 2. No joke. The highest card in my hand: 10. D'OH!!

If I'd cast Fury instead of Unairing Accuracy, I would've killed Pandora with a single hit. She had 5 wounds left. Kealios even suggested I do it, but I said "naw, I already declared. No worries."

Pandora then activates, pushes away with fading memory, and casts a couple self-loathing. Both Viktorias commit sepukku.

So Pandora backs off while Taelor and Hans advance. I'm feeling very leery of trying to take down the witch, but I'm thinking Hans might eventually get her. We flip for ganme ending: less than a 10. Game over, man!

End result:

Neverborn

2 VPs for Hold Out

Outcasts

2 VPs for Slaughter

2 VPs for Thwart

2 VPs for Hold Out.

We talked about it after, if Pandora had killed Taelor and Hans (had the game gone on), he'd have earned 4 VPs I'd have lost Thwart, giving him the edge at 6 VPs vs 4. But then again, had I gotten Pandora it would've been 8 VPs to 2 VPs in my favor.

The VPs very accurately captured what happened: Pandora was on the defensive and it was a pretty good win, but not a thumping.

It was a really fun game and left both of us trying to scrounge more time from the wives to play again.

[Kealios]

My biggest problem with Teddy, who was flanking off to my right, was that he just doesnt have enough actions to work well on his own. Terrain was tight, so I was flying over obstacles, trying to reach Hans in the back, but Taelor moved to intercept. Hard to Wound 1 and Immunity to Fear (except when Pandora was close, which was not often) made her a really bad matchup. Being tossed back over and over was very effective, and made for a humorous situation.

I think Teddy, with Flurry, should actually stand bodyguard next to Kade, and rely on Kade using Lure to get targets into base contact with Teddy, who could then Flurry away happily.

I also should have left a Sorrow with Pandora instead of Kade. Having a Sorrow that far up on the front line just gave the bad guys someone to charge who wasnt terrifying. Shucks.

Oh, and I only had 6 Soulstones at the start of the game. I just always forget to use them until turns 5 and 6 for Initiative reflips, which always fail